Archive 2016 · Help lighting glass

Daniel Moore
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · Help lighting glass

I'd like to ask the group for some advice on lighting cut glass doors. The client is mainly interested in seeing the pattern in the glass. I shot it with some makeshift curtains to block the next room from showing it's countless distractions. I backlit the curtains just a little to keep it from going too white and hiding the pattern. I then shot it again with a black paper background and a softbox from behind to bring out a high contrast pattern. Using the best exposed part of that image (one of many to get all the areas well lit) in a Lighten blend mode layer I was able to bring up some of the pattern a bit more. My problem is that it looks lifeless compared to what one sees normally. It hardly looks like glass anymore, it's so dull in the darker areas. I simply may not be able to have the best of both worlds.

Here's where I'm at, again, only the bottom third of the first pane has received the latest highlight enhancement treatment so far, another 10 or so composites to go, if the client says it's more of what they want.

The right door represents what I provided to the client originally. In the latest treatment you can see the pattern really starting to come out but again, the overall look is, to my eye, lifeless and ugly but it does meet the requirements of showing the cut glass pattern more. I would welcome any advice on a more attractive approach.

And in more detail, the before and after of the bottom of the first pane, neither of which appeal to me.

Apr 23, 2016 at 02:01 PM

Akpilot
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · Help lighting glass

I was just in a glass shop in Venice, Italy yesterday. They had a touch of backlighting to show the intricate detail in the blown glass pieces of art. I would give that a shot.

Apr 23, 2016 at 02:48 PM

Roland W
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · Help lighting glass

What light is falling on the front of the doors? You should work with adjustments to that to see if you can improve things. A very diffuse light as the only light source might help. Or, adjust the angle of a primary light source and the angle of the camera to get less reflection, especially from the main flat areas of the windows. Once you get the front view toned down, then your back light images may work out better. Or, you can add back in a local source of light to bring out some reflections. With steady light, you should be able to see all the effects while adjusting, and not need to wait until post production. Or, examine shots taken with flashes or strobes to see what you are getting. Obviously you do not want to be coming back to the site numerous times trying to get it right.

The classic way to control reflections is with a polarized light source, and an adjustable polarizer on the camera. You may not have time or the interest to get set up for that, but polarizing gel is available to use with speed lights. You would need to eliminate other light sources, and have your polarized source be the primary light, to be able to adjust and control reflections with the polarizer on the camera.

Apr 23, 2016 at 06:12 PM

Daniel Moore
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · Help lighting glass

The front is illuminated by a single 64" PCB parabolic umbrella strobe with front diffusion panel. I love those things for the efficiency and quality of light, though if I weren't so stressed by the technical aspects of this job I would have preferred to have some accent lighting for less of a flat 'scanned' look. With the umbrella being on the camera side of the room the interior reflections were not an issue, even without blacking out the ambient.

There is essentially no reflection due to the light/camera being on the same side. Not sure what you're referring to Roland. If there were reflection on the camera side of the glass I would see the room I shot from, which I see only when I backlight the glass and leave the front light off.

The contours/depth of the cut glass are very challenging to reveal except by backlight and even then, the glass is laminated and offers a terrible amount of internal flare.

I want to rip those doors out and photograph them on the roof, against the polarized light of the sun, after finding a suitable angle to reveal the contours. I told the contractor to be sure next time to photograph them before installation, and composite the glass in post processing, it has to be the best approach. You could control what gets seen through the glass as well as what gets reflected.

I have recently done a job to great success with cross polarization, as you refer to. If I had to go back, I'd add a polarizing sheet to a strip soft box and backlight the glass in segments as needed. That may be the only decent solution to this vexing problem.

Thanks for the input guys. I appreciate it. I've been doing this a long time and this is literally the most challenging job I've had and I feel I've failed the client. You can imagine how that feels at the end of a shoot.

Apr 23, 2016 at 11:35 PM


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