If it's stupid and it works:

Comments

[DoContra]

... it's the natural evolution of Low Cost Cosplay (since I'm awful with names, I'll get this started with "Low Cost Scenography" )

[Backlash91]

I…need context.. what is that? What am I looking at?

[MrNumbers]

5723681

Okay, so, photographing glass is hard. A ton of how you see a glass shape is based on movement. Sort of like how a lot of your depth perception is based on the different speeds things move at relative to your head.

Actually, a better way to put this is to try taking a photo out the side window of a car sometime and seeing just how obstructed that vision is by all sorts of things. Your brain makes a complete image of what you're looking at by using a time dimension and filtering things out and iterating on what you're looking at by superimposing the memory of details on top of what you're seeing.

So stuff that looks super pretty in glass is a pain in the ass to photograph because most of those details only render from one angle of light. You've got to move your head slightly to actually 'see' what you're looking at. A photograph can't do that, you have to simulate that by getting a lighting setup that can do the details justice.

I had this cute little glass owl I just bought and wanted to capture. So I dropped an LED torch into the bottom of a roll of paper towel to hold it up and act as a focus, and then flipped a glass cola bottle upside down into it to act as diffuse and as a stage. So all the lighting for this little guy is coming from below, through the glass bottle, to get the clear refractions I want.

[LtMajorDude]

Jarritos is the best soda ever made.

[LotusTeaDragon]

5723693
Indeed it is, and I wish they had a sugar free version.

MrNumbers, that picture is gorgeous, and thanks for showing us how the sausage was made.

[iisaw]

Genius!

[HorseWordFan]

If it's stupid and it works

"...then it's still stupid, you just got lucky."

That's how I've always had that particular line ended when I mention it to someone . And, in some fairness, my personal experience with stupid ideas has borne this out as well, with every one of them squeaking to success (or not failure, not always the same thing) by a close margin.

But still, nice owl (once I actually figured out that this was what I was looking at).

[Backlash91]

5723682
Ooooooh…it’s an owl.

[JetstreamGW]

5723729
Maxim #43.

[Latrans]

I'll admit it took me until the third picture to figure out what I was looking at, though now that I see it, the second picture is easily the best.