Graphic Design Folio Photographs

[nickhoskin]

Hi guys,

I have been reading the forums for the past couple of months, and am finally posting for my first time!

I am a Graphic Designer and I am trying to put a new folio together and am trying to get some good shots of my printed material. I know the exact look I am after and I am just struggling to replicate it.

I have the following photography gear-
Canon 20D, tripod, kit 17-85 lens, and a 70-200 2.8 L series Canon lens, just a sheet of white card setup as an infinity board, and a white piece of foamcore as a reflector, and I have just been putting tissue paper over a downlight at home to diffuse the light. But so far all of my attempts have been pretty miserable, I have set the White Balance to tungsten on my camera, but still can't get the white's to be a nice clean white.

I am really new to all this photog stuff so any help you guys can give me will be appreciated.

Anyway, here are some examples of the shots I am wanting to get.

[I @ M]

Nick, a couple of questions re: the white balance --- setting it as you have is great but how are you dealing with it in post processing?

Alternatively, can you get the subject matter out doors under early evening or early morning light?
Softer all over natural light may help with multi angular subject matter like your first shot.

You are obviously chasing a degree of perfection to your work and hopefully someone with an idea or three will venture an opinion as well.

[nickhoskin]

Thanks for the quick reply mate,

I will try and try it outside early tomorow morning providing the rain has stopped!

I have heard that a cloudy day is going to be better for this as it will diffuse the light and provide more even lighting?

As for post processing, I have been playing around with the Levels and Colour Balance, Curves, and well as duplicating the layer and setting it as a transparent overlay bloend mode to richen up the contrast.

This is what I have come up with, which to me looks very processed and nowhere near the quality of the images I am trying to replicate. This isn't my work by the way, just a magazine I had laying around I tested with.