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chromasia.com

A few days ago I mentioned that I'd explain the baby project I've been working on in a bit more detail, not least because I'm aware that quite a few of you are getting more than a bit bored with baby shots ;-)

Anyway, the project we're working on is a book on baby photography, commissioned by Ilex Press. The book is organised into various sections, around 60% of which are primarily based around the photographs and some descriptive text (and organised into spreads such as 'family outing', 'brothers and sisters', 'first steps', and so on). The remainder of the book covers various post-processing and technical topics including things like 'on camera lighting', 'planning a shoot', 'converting to black and white' and so on, all of which include one or more photographs and a set of accompanying screen grabs. Today's image will be included in one of the technical sections entitled 'Favourite things montage'.

So far, we've managed to complete almost two-thirds of the book, and the final deadline is March 14th. In total the book will include over 300 images (photographs and screen grabs) and 30,000+ words of text, and we will have had around six or seven weeks to get it all together ... which isn't all that long. And that's why I haven't had time to shoot anything else.

Anyway, we're just about on target, though there may be some seriously late nights as we approach the 14th.

As for this shot: it's a composite of three images, all of which were produced in the same way.

I did think about buying one of those curved plastic studio platforms, but they're quite expensive, so this was shot using a large piece of white cardboard (which cost £1.99), held in a curve by two pieces of string (which cost 49 pence). The lighting was a combination of window light (from our north-facing bedroom window) and flash, bounced from the ceiling. All three images were adjusted to ensure that the background was pure white then they were combined into the final image.

 
non standard
comment by Andy at 07:28 PM (GMT) on 3 March, 2007

David,
I'm a big fan of the baby photo series. Our daughter is 7 months old and, as you could easily imagine, the majority of my own photoblog are baby photos. Its great to see how someone with your experise approaches the subject. You'll have to keep us posted on when the book goes to press, etc. Sounds like something I would be interested in purchasing.

Andy

comment by Jennifer at 07:51 PM (GMT) on 3 March, 2007

Cool shot. Are you doing signed copies ;-)

comment by Ryano at 07:53 PM (GMT) on 3 March, 2007

i enjoyed learning more about your baby project. congratulations David, hope it pays off for you. nice by the way with the cardboard ;)

comment by MikesRightBrain at 08:05 PM (GMT) on 3 March, 2007

Great shots, David, and I like the width of the montage. I can't wait to see the book! Are you doing the 30,000 words? The curved background thingy that people buy always baffles me; I see no reason to have one, esp. if you will likely be going to absolute white on the background. The only reason I could see needing to buy a "real" background or light tent is if you are going to be doing shots of silverware or something where you don't want to see the reflection of the camera.

comment by Richard Trim at 09:05 PM (GMT) on 3 March, 2007

A bit late in the day, but now knowing what the project involves or partly involves, to me what appears to be missing is the relationship of the baby with the parent(s). That bonding relationship is so powerful ...have you got room for a section encompassing that theme. Just a thought.

comment by kwerfeldein at 09:46 PM (GMT) on 3 March, 2007

Even of I am not really down with product-photography, this is a very good sample of how inspiring it can be !

comment by Jonathan at 10:18 PM (GMT) on 3 March, 2007

Seems a tad oversharpened - judging by the jaggies on the line of the eye patch, and around the top left of the white circle on the left plaything....

comment by owen-b at 12:14 AM (GMT) on 4 March, 2007

Blimey, a tad oversharpened??! I'd say that was the result of shrinking something for the web, and it being displayed in 72dpi or ppi or whatever it is, myself...

Sounds like a brilliantly autonomous project, although quite a hefty undertaking and a big ask of you in such a short space of time, photographically! I'd be interested in buying it too, if I had kids or was about to... But I'm not ;) The processing and lighting bit sounds interesting. I like the way you write so much I'd even buy your tutorials just to read your take on things, whether or not the content was specific to my needs.

Nice montage, by the way. Simple, nicely lit, does the job.

comment by laanba at 02:38 AM (GMT) on 4 March, 2007

Ooo... how exciting! Congratulations on the book.

comment by Roy at 11:50 AM (GMT) on 4 March, 2007

It's good to understand the use of this series of photographs in context - and also nice to see Chromasia moving into a new area of activity, with scope for this type of image to be published. Congratulations on the book; it will join a long tradition of such works, the earliest I have being 'Phototips on Children' from Focal Press in 1939 - probably covers some of the same ground!

comment by Arthur at 01:40 PM (GMT) on 4 March, 2007

For a moment, I thought the stork had come early... :-)

comment by DCL at 02:44 PM (GMT) on 4 March, 2007

And here I thought today's photograph meant that you were having a baby boy added to your household ;)

comment by Elinor at 07:07 PM (GMT) on 4 March, 2007

Congratulations on the book! A cool opportunity and certainly helps to understand all the baby photographs that are appearing (which are great regardless). I like today's shot; it is different and I had to make sure I was at the right website for a second. Good luck with that deadline.

comment by Samir at 08:42 PM (GMT) on 4 March, 2007

Congratulations on the book!

comment by djn1 at 10:58 PM (GMT) on 4 March, 2007

Thanks everyone, and my apologies for not posting this evening, but we had an interim deadline for the book today so not much got done.

Andy: I'll let you know when it's published.

Jennifer: yes, if you like :-)

MikesRightBrain: yep, we're writing it all too. So far we have 23,238 words. And you're right, there's no need for a light tent unless you're especially worried about reflections.

Richard: there are a couple of sections in the book that cover the parent/child relationship and I've used previous images from chromasia to cover them.

Jonathan: it's a bit sharp, but the original is around 8000px wide and was resized in CS3. If I'd been working with CS2 I would have used my Web Presenter Pro plugin and the final image would probably have been slightly better.

owen: though it's delayed the production of the tutorials, the book has been good practice at writing this sort of technical material.

Roy: I don't think it's going to redefine the genre, but I'm reasonably pleased with it so far.

Arthur: no, not yet, and we have so much to do at the moment that that wouldn't be good news.

comment by Alice at 03:44 PM (GMT) on 5 March, 2007

Congratulations on the book! That's great news. I know you're excited. You've done a lot of nice work with the baby shots. Keep up the good work!

comment by mooch at 09:02 AM (GMT) on 6 March, 2007

I like this, as triptyches go this works as they are presented as one seamless image rather than a few stuck together.