when the world is shrinking…

Due to the forced isolation and social distancing, any location shoot seems at the moment an unsound idea. However, as creativity runs wildly and equipment needs to be kept in good working use, we can always apply fashion photography and set design concepts to smaller projects.

Then, following a client’s request, using what available at home, yesterday afternoon, I produced a still life shoot.

Inspired by the current climate and the crazy run to toilet paper (no further comments needed!), I decided to shoot the rolls as they were a challenging thing to reach… almost like a high mountain summit! 

Ropes and climbers completed the scene brilliantly.

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Here are the technical and creative solutions I developed to achieve the goal.

The first and most obvious decision has been to place six rolls of paper in a pyramidal, mountain-like shape.

Then I placed miniature climbers (HO 1:87 scale by Preiser, Germany) on the ‘North face of the Eiger’. The red & white climbing ropes (gift wrapping by Paperchase) completed the scene.

To add the perception of the high summit, the camera (Nikon D3X) has to be placed low, pointing upwards.

The lens-of-choice has been the PC-E Micro Nikkor 85mm 1:2.8D, which is my favourite lens for tabletop and food photography. The tilt-shift feature of this beautiful piece of glass allowed me to ‘crank’ the focal plane, making it parallel to the face of the mountain where the climbers were.

That allowed to get all that ‘mountain face’ and the climbers in focus, despite the acute camera-subject angle and the very shallow depth of field. In numbers, the DoF is only 20 millimetres with the chosen camera settings (f/8 1/30 sec. with 105 mm distance from the subject).

Hanging the climbers to the mountain, using blue tack glue dots, has been a delicate and meticulous process.

The sky with stormy clouds in the background is part of the actual scene, and not a composite image applied in postproduction. It is a very out-of-focus gold reflector, which has been changed to blue in Capture One via selective colour adjustment.

Finally, the lighting.

The key lighting, simulating the sunrise bathing the mountain, is a Profoto A1 with a diffusor dome placed above and sideways to the subject. This position accentuates the contrast and texture of the scene.

The fill lighting is only natural light entering the room (f/8 and 1/30 sec. allow the right amount of fill).

I have also added another Profoto A1, hidden behind the mountain and pointing towards the reflector in the background; it creates a spilling glow on the edge of the cliff and a gradient in the sky.

As a final touch, I added a fun caption on top of the image, using the text morphing tool in Affinity Photo.

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Concluding, I would say that this is not a difficult shot. It only requires a good dose of patience to place, check and adjust every single component to the point.

Stay safe and shoot a lot,

Marco

A big thank you for the miniatures to my friend Jon Beswick, founder of Adventure in Architecture.