Red-24's Painted Star Fleet

[Red-24]

I was going to post this under the painting Star Fleet thread, but I didn't want to overwhelm that thread with my photos.

I'm not done yet, but my Federation ships are starting to turn out nice. Now I just need some slide off decal, printer paper.

I took some photos with my Samsung Galaxy S Captivate. Somehow, it takes better close ups of minis than my Canon Powershot camera. Anyway, I hope you enjoy the photos.

The USS Burke

The USS Federation

 

[Red-24]

Oh yeah, you can also see tons of photos of my overall progress in this album: Red-24's Starline 2500 minis

 

[Nerroth]

Very nice so far!

I look forward to seeing what you do with the Fed OCL.

 

[MarkDawg]

Dude you have skills taking pictures as well. Nice work indeed. What was your take on the minis them selves?

 

[Red-24]

Dude you have skills taking pictures as well. Nice work indeed. What was your take on the minis them selves?

Thanks.

The minis are awesome, but these early production models took a long, long time to prep. For the 15 models, I spent between 20 to 25 hours cleaning up the crud and assembling. Mongoose is replacing 6 of the ships that just had crappy mold slippage lines, but I made them usable. On the table top, after painting, you wont see a difference.

I've been told that I will be much happier with the replacements. If I can clean up and assemble a ship in under an hour, I'll be very happy indeed.

 

[tomrommel1]

stunning painting and pictures !!!!!!!

 

[nerfherder]

Nice paint jobs. Thanks for posting them.

I took some photos with my Samsung Galaxy S Captivate. Somehow, it takes better close ups of minis than my Canon Powershot camera.

That is probably because the sensor in your phone is much smaller than the one in your camera, giving a greater depth of field. I discovered this with my DSLR when trying to take pictures of minis - everything but a tiny slice of the figure would be out of focus, unless I used a very narrow aperture. My compact camera kept more of the mini in focus.

 

[AdrianH]

I like the paintwork, especially the front caps on the warp nacelles.

The photos are excellent! Did you achieve that by spot lighting or by using something like Photoshop to turn the whole background black?

I'm not so sure that the depth of field is related to the sensor size so much as the lens and aperture - mobile phone camera are practically pinhole cameras. I'll have to try experimenting with a piece of card with a small hole in front of a camera set to close-up focus...

Another useful piece of software is CombineZM:
http://www.hadleyweb.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/CZM/combinezm.htm

If you can get several shots of the same object from exactly the same position with different focus settings, this will merge the sharp parts to create one sharp image of the whole object.

 

[nerfherder]

I'm not so sure that the depth of field is related to the sensor size

If you google sensor size and dof, you'll see plenty of articles that explain it. Aperture and focal length affects it too, obviously.

Thanks for the link to the stacking software. Ideal for static macro shots (like minis)

 

[Barticus]

Nice paint jobs. Thanks for posting them.

I took some photos with my Samsung Galaxy S Captivate. Somehow, it takes better close ups of minis than my Canon Powershot camera.

That is probably because the sensor in your phone is much smaller than the one in your camera, giving a greater depth of field. I discovered this with my DSLR when trying to take pictures of minis - everything but a tiny slice of the figure would be out of focus, unless I used a very narrow aperture. My compact camera kept more of the mini in focus.

A tripod (tabletop version is fine), large aperture setting and a remote trigger (or timed shutter) really helps with that. Of course, minis make excellent target for micro photography too as they don't move.

 

[andywatkins1963]

Excellent paint jobs and I love the photography, how did you do the main pics with the black background?

 

[Red-24]

I like the paintwork, especially the front caps on the warp nacelles.

Thanks. About 20 minutes into painting the warp nacelle caps I started thinking "Why didn't I just go with one colour?" But they did turn out great; worth the extra work.

I like the paintwork, especially the front caps on the warp nacelles.
The photos are excellent! Did you achieve that by spot lighting or by using something like Photoshop to turn the whole background black?

Nothing too fancy. Just draped the felt I used for gaming over my paint case on the dining room table and put a flashlight on a Star Fleet Squadron box a couple feet away. I diffused the flashlight a bit by throwing a small plastic container over the end. I then put a book and some paper in the way to cast a shadow over the figure's base.

Like this:

Just make sure the flashlight isn't shooting too much onto the felt. Also, the dining room light was off, but the kitchen light was on casting some light onto the opposite side of the figure. I should also mention that it's an led flashlight, giving a very white light.

The end result is like this:

 

[andywatkins1963]

Very clever I would never have thought of it, must give it a try

 

[Red-24]

Yes. And note that I didn't even clear off the table. ;-)

 

[Red-24]

Ok. I actually got my Klingon squadron complete before Trumpeter Salute, Vancouver this weekend. I still have Federation and Romulan squadrons to finish, so I probably won't upload any photos until after the weekend.

Here they are:

You know, looking at them like this, they sure don't look like they took as much time as they did. ;-)

 

[Red-24]

Got my Romulans done (well, done enough) today. I also picked up a portable studio lighting kit to take photos of my minis. I figure I do it often enough it was worth the investment. Here are some Romulan shots, plus you can see more shots of the Klingons in the light box here: https://plus.google.com/u/0/103588561671775506183/posts/NYhG8pdY978.

 

[tomrommel1]

very nice indeed!!!!!

 

[Davros1]

Excellent minis !!!! Any more shots of the full rom sqd ?

 

[Captain Jonah]

I'm sure this has been asked before but I cannot find it or remember it.

Where do the base stickers come from. Yes I know its been asked before, at my age the memory goes :roll: :wink:

 

[Red-24]

Any more shots of the full rom sqd ?

Not yet. Gotta finish my Feds today, plus 8 mounted Cowboys. Likely no more shots until Monday.

Where do the base stickers come from?

I made them myself. Paintshop Pro, an inkjet printer, and inkjet label sheets can do wonders.

Send me a PM with your email and I'll send you the .JPG.