Photographing Fused Glass

A while ago, someone asked me to share how I photograph my work. Taking pictures of glass can be tricky business. I use a light box setup that is not at all sophisticated but I get some decent results that are adequate for my needs.

Photo Booth (1)I first purchased this small and inexpensive light box that served me well for many years. It came with two small halogen lamps. I added an overhead clamp light. My husband cemented a long stick in a coffee can so I can adjust the height. All of this is set it up on my unused sewing machine cabinet.

Last year, my pieces got too big to fit in the booth, so I created my own. For my current setup, I bought some white fabric that I attached to a trifold project board with clothespins. I sandblasted two pieces of clear glass and set them up on clamps to work as light diffusers. It works fairly well, but I could use something to diffuse the light from above as well. Eventually I may need to build something a bit more stable, but for now it works. I have been thinking about mounting a curtain rod along the wall that I could drape the fabric from. This would make it easier to change the color of the background.

Photo Booth (3)I have found that the key to getting good results is a camera with a manual setting. I have a Cannon Power Shot Elph 130. I use the manual mode and set the white balance and brightness manually. The macro mode on the camera is essential for closeups. The final tweaking is done in a photo editing program called Paint.NET. The program is a free program and does all the things I need it too and a whole lot more that I don’t know anything about. I basically use Paint.NET to rotate, crop, resize, adjust brightness and contrast, add my copyright, and perform some minor touch-ups.

 

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