On 2013-04-22, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 22 Apr 2013 08:09:09 +0700, J.B.Slocomb
wrote:

A light box is handy but it only serves to light the entire object and
eliminate shadows. You can use reflectors and diffusers to do
essentially the same thing with, probably, more bother.

Try some diffusers made from thin white plastic in front of your flash
and (probably) three or four flash heads and see if you can't get the
effects that you want.

Or one flash head, moved around and popped three or four times.

This works fine with film -- but keeping the shutter open on
digital keeps the sensor active, and thermal noise builds up with long
exposures. Some have a noise reduction system which matches the
exposure time with shutter open with an equivalent exposure time with
shutter closed, and subtracts the latter from the former. This cancels
some of the thermal effects of long exposures, but also slows down the
shot rate. I turn that feature off when doing things like capturing
town fireworks on the 4th, so I can go to the next shot more quickly.

[ ... ]

An electronic camera is nice as you don't need to waste all the trial
shots that you do with film.

'Second that. I even use one for doing test shots, to balance the
lights, when I'm doing the final on 4 x 5 film and using a Minolta
Flashmeter IV for exposure.

So you have not depended on the results from the digital, except
as a rough guide -- so you may not have seen the effects of the long
open shutter time, since you probably did not bother blowing up the
image on your computer monitor.

Enjoy,
DoN.

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