Another Oldie, but Goodie.........

This is a Young Miniatures Bust...  One of the first ones that were all metal...  

I re-shot the picture of this.    This is also one of the last pieces I painted the face with oils..

My Photographic Set Up

Below is a picture of my photographic set up.  I have labeled the picture to show the components.  You can use any DSLR camera that will take a hot shoe mounted flash transmitter for the flash.  You can also use any manual flash that can be triggered by the receiver.  I use a Canon 430EXII for the main flash- set to manual mode so I can select the power (1/8 power).  The second flash (Vivitar 383) does not have a receiver, but is set as a "slave" that is triggered by the Canon's flash when it goes off.  I usually have that one set to 1/16 power.  You can play with the power settings and the distance to the subject to get the light you like.  The triggers I use are Calumet Pro Series, but there are several on ebay for under $30.00.  You can go with two inexpensive speedlights- look on ebay- all you need is ones that work in manual mode.  Whats fun too is you can use white foam core or cardboard to make simple reflectors to illuminate parts of the figure or model.  Sometimes I use a fluorescent or halogen lamp to illuminate the background.

I shoot in manual mode on the camera- usually something like 125 sec @ f8.0 or 9.0   pretty simple.  A couple of test shots shows you right away what you will get.  Faster shutter speed will darken the background.  Make sure your figure is about 10"-12" from the background to avoid shadows and give nice out of focus blur.  The background is available from Hangar 18 Miniatures.

British Pilot WW1

I don't know if I have ever shown this figure.  It's a 54mm (small for me) Latorre WW! British pilot.  Painted with acrylics...

Some More Photos.......

Here are a few more pictures of the Josey Wales bust...

Josey Wales

Well,  here is the finished bust of Josey Wales....  A lot of work,  even harder to photograph with the hat....

New Lighting Set Up

I take a LOT of pictures of figures......  I have been using two old- I mean really old constant lights- Victor 8" photoflood with CFL bulbs. These are attached to some really janky light stands.   Although it works, it has limits on controlling the light and the amount of light.  So I just switched to using two strobes (Canon Speed light and a Vivitar 383).  I have them set up with a small softbox and diffuser- plus new light stands.
Although there is a learning curve for flash- its pretty simple.  Set everything to Manual and fire away.  Of course there is more to it.  I have manual flash triggers attached to the strobes and to my Canon 60d.   So far I like the control and the nice color  (white) balance.  So here are a couple of test shots.  Actually Josey Wales is shot with this set up too.

Josey Wales

This is Legends and Lore (out of business company) 1/9 scale bust of "The Outlaw Josey Wales".  The kit is terrible except for the face.  I had to re sculpt a lot of the figure, plus scratch build two Colt Walker pistols.  So here is the progress so far........

A New Issue of Model Military International

Here is issue 94 with my WW1 British Infantry on the cover!