To the expert photographers out there:

[Finlos]

Do you have any advice on how I can take pictures of small minis (in this case my Klingon F5) and have the entire mini in focus? I took some quick shots this morning and here's the 4 pics I came up with:

Here would be my favourite pic but the whole thing looks slightly out of focus

Here the rear hull is good but the boom is blurry

Here the boom is good but the rear hull is blurry

Here it appears to be focusing on the base (with the bonus that the boom looks clear)

The camera in question is a Canon PowerShot G5 (old, I know...). I know about the close-up button and I turned the flash off. These pictures were all taken with natural sunlight.

Thanks in advance to any advice you all are able to give me. I look forward to being able to take better pictures!

 

[McKinstry]

If the camera is a digital SLR, a number of them have a reasonably priced macro lens, most of which can get far closer than even the finest paint job can withstand.

 

[billclo]

#1 tip, use a tripod and very bright lighting. Use macro setting if your camera has it.

#2, don't try to get a front shot, because as you found the camera will focus on the front of the mini and the rest will be blurry. Try to get a shot that is at say the 10pm or 2pm position, aiming the camera at the junction of the boom and the body.

 

[The Big D]

First, I'm not an expert photographer just an amateur with a cheap camera and a cheaper tripod!

This is what I managed to get dead on with goodish non directish light.

I set my camera as far away as I could and zoomed in as much as I could with the built in optical zoom while keeping the miniature filling most of the field. This was about 3 feet away. The relative distance to the different parts of the ship from the lens is greatly reduced and will then stay in focus better!

Don't bother with digital zoom. This just crops and expands the existing image and doesn't actually improve it.

Another tip is to take lots of pics from the same point. Some will be less blurry than others. Use the best.

Geoff

 

[Barticus]

What you're looking for is a good depth of field. You can get this by using a very small aperture (f18, f20, f22..somewhere around there). What this does is severely restrict the amount of light getting to the sensor, but allows for more of the object to be in focus. Don't ask me why this is, exactly, I just know it works. The problem is that the shutter will need to be open for a long, long time in order for there to be something more than a black frame, so a tripod is absolutely essential. Since the camera has to be held absolutely still, a remote trigger might also be handy, but most cameras these days have a timer which works just as well. If you have a digital SLR, it will likely have an 'aperture priority' setting where you can manually set the aperture and the camera will worry about how long to keep the shutter open for. Otherwise you will have to experiment, which is cheap in a digital camera. Try something around f20 and a shutter time of about 5 seconds, see how that works, and go from there.

B

 

[Finlos]

Thanks for the responses all, I'm going to have to take a moment or three to process all the tips you've given me. I went and downloaded the manual for my camera after I realized I didn't have it which should enable me to use the above tips.

 

[AdrianH]

Another solution if your camera allows manual focus is CombineZM:
http://hadleyweb.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/CZM/News.htm

You need to take two shots from exactly the same angle, one focussed on the rear of the ship and the other focussed on the front. CombineZM will then take the sharp bits from both and create one focussed image. So you put the camera on a tripod, focus on the bow and take a photo, re-focus on the stern and take a photo, then let CombineZM do its stuff.

Another trick: the camera may have much higher resolution than you'll need for a photo on the Internet, so instead of shooting close up, stand back a bit. The ship won't then fill the whole frame, but that won't matter if you take, say, a 9MP (3456x2592) photo and clip a 1024x768 frame out of the middle.

 

[nerfherder]

You've had some good replies already, but I thought I'd add my 2 pence

For small, static scenes like a miniature, you will get the most consistent results with a tripod, manual exposure and manual focus settings. You can experiment, changing one variable at a time, and immediately see the results.

1. Mount the camera on a tripod, about 10 cm from the model. Set the model at an oblique angle. Feel free to experiment with this distance.
2. Set the camera to Manual exposure mode - see p81 of the manual.
3. Set the Aperture to the largest number (technically a larger number means a smaller aperture, but going into all that will just confuse) you can (probably something like f/8 on the G5), and set the shutter speed to a value such that the exposure compensation reads zero.
4. Use the LCD display to set the Auto Focus point - see p82 of the manual. Alternatively use Manual Focus (pg 106). Focus about one third of the way back from the front of the model.
5. Use a remote control to activate the shutter, or self-timer if a remote isn't available.

This should give a reasonable baseline to start from. Once you are happy that you are getting the whole model in focus, then you can experiment with lighting (which makes a huge difference to the look of a photo), positioning and exposure (you may have to deviate from the exposure compensation reading of zero, as the exposure meter expects the whole scene to contain a certain amount of grey, and you are possibly going to fill it more with a good chunk of white (Feds) and/or black (space). So, use the built in meter as a guide to get a first cut setting for your exposure, but don't hesitate to over or under expose.

 

[Finlos]

Time to get myself a camera stand. My hands just aren't steady enough anymore.

Couple more pictures as I play with the settings on my camera:

Forgot to turn the flash off here. It distorts the colours but really brings out the details.

Perhaps my best photo yet, after I deleted all the blurry ones. Not completely in focus sadly but I think the camera stand will help a lot.

Unrelated note: I'm unimpressed with the stands Mongoose provides with the minis. They break way to easily when turning minis around on the stand.

 

[archon96]

yea i have had that issue two, im looking into some alternatives but most are pricey.

 

[AdrianH]

Perhaps my best photo yet, after I deleted all the blurry ones. Not completely in focus sadly but I think the camera stand will help a lot.

The problem is still depth of field - if one end of the ship is in focus then the other end is out of focus. That shot might have worked better if you had focused on the front end of the starboard engine nacelle, then both bow and stern would have been a little out of focus but not by as much as the bow is in that photo.

Where a stand will help is if you use CombineZM as I suggested earlier. Provided you have two shots taken from the same angle, which you can do with a stand, CombineZM takes the best bits out of both (or, for that matter, more than two) and produces one good photo.

Unrelated note: I'm unimpressed with the stands Mongoose provides with the minis. They break way to easily when turning minis around on the stand.

The ball needs a little careful filing to allow it to turn within the socket. And I mean careful! Too much filing will leave the ball too loose in the socket, and the ship prone to tip over in classic TV-style "dead in space" pose. Practice on stands for the small frigates first, they're more likely to stay upright if you overdo it. Also, don't glue the stem into the ball - leave the ball permanently inside the socket and remove the stem when you want to pack the ship for transport.

 

[nerfherder]

Time to get myself a camera stand. My hands just aren't steady enough anymore.

Yep, a camera stand will allow you to use a narrow aperture (greater depth of focus) with the corresponding long shutter speed without getting blurry pics. Keep us updated.