Doing The Twist - With Hoya and Chubby Checker

Okay, we don't actually have Chubby Checker but we do have Hoya.

And if you don't know who Chubby Checker, the Peppermint Lounge, or the Twist were, there are classes in retro conducted at TAFE - we suggest you enrol yourself...

Any rate, this post is as a result of seeing advertisements on the net that miss out on one of the basic fundamentals of the business - when you need to show the pack you need to show the pack. Many times the lighting on the packs has been arranged to illuminate it but obscure the surface detail - the product isn't seen effectively.

The glare of reflected light off the surface is what is doing it - and the answer to the problem is as simple as buying a good polarising filter and keeping it one the front of the lens.

We sell lots of polarisers to landscape photographers who wish to darken skies, see through water surfaces, or correct colours outside under a blue sky. They use up a stop of light but clean up the scene remarkably. What the studio shooters may not realise is that these same filters can do a good job inside under artificial illumination.

The pack shots of a portion of my lunch are a case in point. The illumination box being used is a simple Optex Studio-in-a-Box rig. We sell them for $ 249 and they are magic for small,quick advertising illustration. There are two curly fluorescent tubes sitting either side of the box that shine though adiffusers. They generate enough polarised light themselves as to obscure details on shiny surfaces. Look at the side and front views.

Then look and see what happened when I put a good Hoya HD polariser on the front of the Fujinon lens ( X-E2 and an 18-55 ). Cleaner colour and clearer detail. As it is a studio setup with a tripod the extra exposure time makes no difference.

In a studio? Try a polariser.