Welcome to the GeekShot Photo Exclusive Series. This will be a weekly post featuring cool, interesting, or just plain awesome moments we have captured during San Diego Comic-Con and WonderCon. Each week we’ll post a photo by Beth or James of GeekShot Photography. We may include a short story about the photo, but sometimes we’ll just let the photo speak for itself.
About This Photo
Masters of the Universe He-Man 1/4 statue by Pop Culture Shock Collectibles at WonderCon 2015.
It seems I can’t go very long without posting a statue photo. The PCS booth had a small but good selection of statues at WonderCon this year. There weren’t very many other exhibitors showing off similar pieces so I spent some time getting photos here. The larger than most 1/4 scale helps show off the detail.
While this perspective makes for a cool “middle of the action” shot, it probably wouldn’t be very effective for marketing. It only shows off the detail of the head and part of the breastplate. If you want people to see what the entire statue looks like, you’ll need to get the standard wide shot. You’ll also need to make sure to use a smaller aperture so the depth of field is wider and the entire statue is in focus. What makes this difficult at conventions is mainly the glass cases that surround them and lower light. You’ll need to battle reflections as well as high ISO if you want a full statue shot. Plus, you can’t use flash as that will cause an even worse reflection.
It can be done though, but you’re going to have to make compromises. If you want to try and get rid of reflections, get a circular polarizer filter for the lens you plan to use. When used correctly a CP filter will reduce/remove reflections. The drawback is it also lowers the amount of light reaching your sensor by about 2 stops. Less light means you have to use a wider aperture, slower shutter, and/or higher ISO. Since you’ll likely be shooting fairly wide, you can put your shutter down to 1/20-1/50th, and maybe even lower with a steady hand and good image stabilization. You probably won’t want to go too wide on the aperture to keep your depth of field, so higher ISO is the last option. You should test your ISO at the high levels to see if you’re comfortable with the amount of grain and loss of color/detail it will cause. Whatever combination you choose, testing in advance will help you decide how to shoot when at the convention.
Another tip for cutting reflections is to put the lens right next to the glass of the case. The closer you get the less chance of getting anything reflected.
Do you have any tips for getting statue shots at a convention? Let us know in the comments.
You can see all of the previous posts in this series here.
