Hi, I just wanted some opinions on my photo of Sam. I thought it would be interesting ( and a challenge) to try to photograph my black kitty on a black fuzzy blanket. I used three lights: a hairlight above and to the left of her, and two lights at 45 degrees of either side of her.

i wish hat she was looking at me, but this was the best I could get from her.

Let me know what you think or if you have suggestions, please let me know.

Earline
http://www.ekgphotography.com

I think you did good. the image is too small really for me to see much detail, and i think there's a bit too much dead space on the right side of the crop, but the exposure is very good!

Hey Earline,

I agree with Tony. It might be best to see the image slightly larger if possible. Black on black is hard to do. There appears to be a slight shine to the cat's eyes, which may be a result of reflection from the angle of the light into the cat's eyes.

James

Earline,
let's see it bigger, please. It looks great from the thumbnail.

I love shooting black on black and use it a lot with my Rotties. Here's a recent example.



See if you can upload a larger image of your cat.

Jim

I also recently posted a photo recently like that here. They are quite hard to do, but I love the effect.

Cheers
James

Thanks for the comments everyone. Here she is a little bigger. I do see the light reflection in her eye. Maybe I should have moved the light a little lower so that it was more even with her face.

By the way, the posted photos here are gorgeous. I am impressed with the detail and sheen of the fur in both pictures.

Earline

Earline,
keep in mind that the fur is different in both my image and James'. In show photography, we talk about dogs that are invisible to the camera -- Newfies, Black Chows, Keeshunds, some Poodles. Basically, they have no reflective surface and so the autofocus really can't see them unless you focus on their outline.

Same goes for shooting your cat on the velvet black background -- the cat basically doesn't reflect light so it's hard to get that sheen regardless of where you set up your lights. Rotties, Black Labs and other breeds are different because their coats reflect the light.

I use two strobes with silver umbrellas, set high, about 30 degrees off of center for my Rottie portraits. That gives me maximum reflectivity even on a black background.

I like your cat shot. The eyes just pop off the image. As you would expect from a black cat .

Jim

I think it's fantastic, I love the almost hidden black body and then those gold eyes just dominate the image. It's different than the usual pose, beautiful!