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Subject: 
Re: Minifig Portraits
Newsgroups: 
lugnet.castle, lugnet.general
Date: 
Wed, 17 Oct 2001 01:19:39 GMT
Viewed: 
358 times
  
ive got something to add to this (if you don't mind anthony)

if you don't have a good digital camera, i personally use an ol fashioned SLR
(single lens reflex) and chemical film. SLR is good because what you see is
what you get, and that helps frame the shot.

now the big thing for photographing legos with an SLR are closeup filter/lens.
these are little filter thingies that you screw on to the front of your lens
that shortens the depth of field your camera is capable of (ie.  allows you to
get closer to your subject). you should be able to get them from any decent
photostore for ~$40.. bring your camera so you know they fit.

for lighting, anthony's advise is very good.. but don't discredit old fashioned
lighting: the sun. the sun's light is intrinsically beautiful, and better than
anything you can creat artificially.. unfortunately the sun has its own
schedule.

and the all important question: how do i turn negatives into jpegs? what i do,
since i don't own a scanner and don't want to do all that scanning anyways, is
to develop it and get the "picture disc" or "picture cdrom" from like walmart
or kmart or something.. they all do it now for ~$5..

i try to do more than one minifig per shot to cut on costs and then use
photoshop or something to cut them apart.

my site: http://www.lugnet.com/~1168/caerany/ has all its minifig shots done
with this method, if you want to know how it looks.

hope this helps at all.
peace
-lenny

ps. welcome anthony!


I don't know of one, though I'm sure one exists.  However, if you're • interested
I can give you some pointers.  What I use, first, is a high quality digital
camera.  However, a simple film camera will work too.  Just remember, you need
to be close enough to get decent detail, but far enough away so that you don't
get unecessary glare and fuzziness.  Remember, you'll get a big enough picture
when you scan in your photos, so don't try to get too close.  A good reference
is a foot and a half to two feet for film cameras, and three feet for digital.

I never use a flash for lighting, its too unpredictable where the light will
go, since you can't leave the flash on before you take the shot.  So instead I
use an artists lamp shining close to the minifig.  What it is, basically, is a
normal 60 watt bulb surrounded by a flourescent one.  The light the two give
off is very similar to natural sunlight, so you get good color on your
pictures.  However not all of my figs had the benefit of this, so those figs
have red that looks rather pink.  The digital camera that I use brightens
things automatically, and I haven't read the manual enough to figure out how • to
stop this.  If you don't have the benefit from an artists lamp, then simply
take your fig into a room with flourescent lighting, and take with you a lamp.
Remove the shade from the lamp and place it as far away from your fig as the
flourescent light is.  It should give you the same effect.

After that, you need to get a tripod.  I don't know about anyone else, but my
hands shake far to much to take a decent freehand picture.  I always use a
tripod to take my pictures.  If you use a very fast film, it doesn't really
matter then, but digital cameras aren't THAT fast.

Lastly, pick a good backdrop for your picture.  I usually take the picture in
front of my latest Castle MOC.  I personally think it looks better than • having,
say, a cloth backdrop, or none at all.

Anyway, thats all I can think of at the moment, and I hope that helps.

--Anthony
http://www.geocities.com/savatheaggie/legohome.html



Message has 1 Reply:
  Re: Minifig Portraits
 
I too have an old (really old) SLR camera. I have a few additional comments. I began, recently, to always use a white background. even it the actual picture background is lego. I bought one of those giant post-it note pads and stuck one sheet to the (...) (23 years ago, 17-Oct-01, to lugnet.castle, lugnet.general)

Message is in Reply To:
  Minifig Portrates (was Re: I'm a member!)
 
(...) I don't know of one, though I'm sure one exists. However, if you're interested I can give you some pointers. What I use, first, is a high quality digital camera. However, a simple film camera will work too. Just remember, you need to be close (...) (23 years ago, 16-Oct-01, to lugnet.castle, lugnet.general)

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