Since @shanemielke was asking about the lighting for my latest toy shots, so I figured I’d post a little write-up.

The setup is pretty basic with just 2 soft boxes and one reflector. Since the toys are so small, the slightest movement on the lights makes a pretty dramatic change in the reflections.

• Some shots had the top light directly above, others had it pushed more towards the rear. 
• I moved the second soft box moved from the left side to right on several occassions, and in a few I turned it off altogether. Just like the top light, tiny adjustments turning the head left/right were done to get the right areas lit up.
• The reflector was simply used to create some additional “white” highlights. 

Although the lighting was similar to how I shot the silver version, the look is completely different due to the gloss black finish on this toy.

I’ve been really happy with Aperture 2 so there wasn’t any need for any Photoshop work. All the post was done in Aperture, so the shots were taken, edited and uploaded within a few hours.

Love the Dodge and Burn tool, but wish it could be non-destructive and remain in RAW instead of creating a new raster image every time the tool is used and can't be edited…but it's great to be able to do this all within Aperture. In my workflow now, it's simply the last step so in case I need to revert, most of my changes are stored in the version just before Dodge and Burn. I really only use it to fix “problem” areas so re-doing it is generally pretty easy.

{ Sent from my iPhone }

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