We’re trying to find a good-sized area of sky to function as a background for our bottle. Select a window that has a good view, and remember, we want our sky above the bottle to be free of things we’ll need to take out later. Next, place a glass vase or jar on the window ledge. Try to find a glass vessel that is simple, so that it’s edge is not too difficult to erase later. Use a vase that is small enough to hold the soda bottle nearly upright. I needed to wedge a tiny piece of packing foam into into the arrangement, so that the bottle didn’t tip and fall. I also glued the glass vase to the windowsill. The reason we are shooting the bottle in a window is that the absense of light on either side of the bottle will help insure that we get darker tonalities refracted in the bottle’s profile.
Then I sat down on the floor across the room from the window and zoomed in as close as I could. I scooted backwards on my bottom until the entire bottle was in the frame (and the seat of my pants were dirty). It’s important to use a telephoto lens, or at least a zoom lens. By positioning yourself on the floor, below the window ledge, you will be distorting the traditional shape of the bottle, to suggest the shape of a dove. We don’t need to exagerrate that distortion too much by using a wide-angle lens. I had my little G9 hooked up to a 580EX flash, with a Sto-Fen diffusion filter. I use a coiled flash extension cord, so that I don’t need to place the flash in the hotshoe. This gives you more options when shooting people, and other similar forms (such as empty soda bottles). I tried to point the flash as the near side of the bottle, directly opposite the bright backlight coming through the window.
I just sit there waiting for the clouds to behave. I should say something about the photographer, famous for waiting for good light. Cartier-Bresson coined the phrase “the decisive moment” to discuss this idea of waiting for your subjects to happen. Bresson said, “Oop! The Moment! Once you miss it, it is gone forever.” If you live in Chicago like I do, all you have to do is wait about a half hour, and the sky will change. An ever changing sky is good for photography, because it offers you more choices. Most skies you shoot on the day you shoot the bottle will work. Once I got a nice bright exposure of the bottle, I took it off the window ledge and waited on the floor for a good cloud shot. There was no longer any need for the flash at this point, since the sky cannot be illuminated with it. Shoot as many sky shots as you can.
Found in 101 STUDIES, EVERYTHING.
Coke Bottle
This image is the before & after for the “Coke Bottle Project”. I’ll post a number of video tutorials on how this image was created, and how you can create your own nostalgic ad illustration, using your photos as a starting point. The first thing I did when creating the Coke bottle image was to look for a good window. If you have a window in your home that faces North or South, this is preferable. Find a window with few obstructions.
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