Who Likes A Little Bling??

Brandi's "flare" on her jacket made me think of bling. Not sure why, maybe it was all the little pins that it had on it. Those of you that know me, know that bling is not my thing, I don't typically swing that way. Go ahead and laugh, it was meant to be cheesy haha. But I do have a few things, so I went scrounging through my jewelry box and found something that might twinkle and flare. My first attempts were pathetically bad so I decided to wait for my husband to get home so we could have a pow wow together on what to do. I knew what I wanted, I just had to figure out how to get there. His brain though very different from mine complements my brain, between the two of us we can usually come up with something cool.

Nikon D90
Lens 50mm fixed
ISO 200
Apeture F3.2
Shutter 1/25 sec.
No Flash, ummm flashlight with filter

This was another one of those pictures where I had to look around and try to find something to photograph. "Bling" always reminds me of light and shiny things as does "flare".

For my set up we went downstairs to our basement and used one of those little kid tables. You know the ones where if any normal size adult were to sit down, their knees don't fit under the table. I placed a white sheet on the table and then used a couple of tri-pods to lift up the sheet so we would have a plain white background so as not to have anything interfer with the background. I then took a strand of white Christmas tree lights and placed them behind my main object for actual usuable light and to add some extra light interest in the picture. I am also trying to figure out how to blur tree lights so I can use that technique for our family Christmas picture. I snagged a crystal vase from my mother-in-laws curio cabinet and a necklace of mine from one of my good friend's weddings in which I was a bridesmaid. So there was my bling.

At first I tried to use my wireless remote Nikon Speedlights to flash on the object and give it some twinkle. Nikon has a system where my D90 is considered a commander and I can signal, wirelessly several different flashes that can be placed around what it is you are photographing. This is an awesome technique to use because I can get studio lighting in onsite locations without the mess of wires and fairly minimum equipment. You can also set each flash to a different strength, depending upong available lighting and what you want to do. Long story to say that I did not like the results with the flash. So Jonny had this great idea to use a small penlight for some straight, rather harsh lighting. We then placed several different colored filters over the penlight to give the light a different hue. Not completely satisfied with the results, but again this is a learning in process for me and I am definately stretching myself with these kinds of shots.

Let's see how Jay'me likes a little bling!