Thursday, September 24, 2009

African Mast #2, St. Louis Art Museum



This fierce and beautiful mask is one of the more elaborately carved examples in the collection on display, this subject presented a number of challenges.  First it is behind glass with a number of reflections.  Second, it is really dark, despite the spotlight.  Finally, the color balance of the spotlight is odd, maybe 3000K.  Since this is typical of the kind of shooting I like to do in a museum, I purchased the new Nikkor 50mm f1.4G.  With this lens, the veiwfinder is bright enough to see potential issues.  Shooting at f/2.0 kept the glass reflections at a minimum.

Technial: Nikon D700, Nikkor AF-S 50mm f1.4G, ISO 200, f/2.0 @ 1/20s handheld, auto white balance. RAW file processed in Lightroom 2.4.  The primary adjustment was finding the odd-ball color balance.

No comments: