The Burkheimer Factor

Tuesday I had a call from Mikko, a very good friend of mine. Mikko manages Helsinki Spey Clave, a very high calibre fly fishing store in downtown Helsinki.
Mikko was in need of some fairly urgent product images for a last minute advertisement that would appear in a mainstream fishing magazine, Perhokalastus.

Not directly fly tying related stuff here but close enough for me to post and ramble about.

The products, happened to be some of the worlds finest fly rods made by C F Burkheimer, specifically made for the store, brandishing a 'Helsinki Spey Clave' signature series logo on the rod blank.

Time was not on our side (when is it ever?) and the only available location at such short notice was 'Studio El Living Room'. During the day I had been shooting a few tennis matches for a potential client but did manage to whip up a wee sketch:


So at least I had a rough idea. I was aiming for a very standard product type shot, hanging the rods with monofilament line in front of a white background. Not the most exciting look but safe for such a time sensitive job. If I had more time, I would have liked to shoot the rods against some matured wood, like oak or rosewood maybe, peppered with relative accompaniments.




Here you can see Mikko hanging a rod for it's portrait on the ghetto boom rig, constructed from two light stands and a Manfrotto Super Clamp. The boom for the softbox was weighted with a mini dumbell in a camo shoulder bag ;)
The flagged flashes for the background are set in a cross over pattern, blowing out the opposite side of the wall nice and evenly. I needed a fairly rapid recycle time so these backlights were at 1/8th power.

The key light being the Lastolite Ezybox, was at 1/2nd power, the specular highlight granted by the softbox didn't quite make it all the way along the rod blank so this highlight had to be continued with a SB-800 at 1/4th power with a shoot through umbrella. Originally we were going to light a large white bed sheet with two speedlights to give a nice long strip of light but these plans were thwarted after discovering white bed linens are now apparently extinct.

We also employed the assistance of a large white piece of board to reflect a little light under the rod to soften the shadows.

All in all, I think we did a good job, total set up and shooting time was just under three hours.
Needless to say, after striking down, there was much merriment and rejoicing!