Today I worked in the studio for the first time in a long while and my reason for doing so was to focus on Gastropods or much more commonly know Snails. I have begun to photograph them in their natural habitat and environment but using a studio I can take away all the other distractions that environment may bring so you can focus on the detail of the subject matter. This is done by using a white backdrop so that all the other colours will stick out more, this can also be done using a black or grey backdrop but in this case I used white. My idea for this was inspired by one of my favourite photographer Charlie Hamilton James who recently bought a part of the rainforest and to catalogue all the species he found he decided to photograph them in a studio setting similar to this. I was also inspired by "Meet Your Neighbours" which was founded in 2009 and is a photographic project to show people the wildlife around them by giving the animals/creatures the celebrity treatment. The reason I chose snails is because they are often over looked, so I am hoping through my photography that I could possibly make people pay more attention to what's around them and to appreciate how wonderful this small creature is up close if you give your self the time of day to stop and admire.
I used a variety of garden snails (Helix Aspersa) of all sizes and also tried to photograph them interacting with each other. It seems snails can be quite a social creature and enjoys climbing onto the other snails shell, which was about to happen in the photograph here but then they soon seem to loose interest and move away. The shoot went quite well today, I used a Nikon D810 with a 105 mm Macro lens, along with a studio light system 5000 on a shooting table which is used for this type of macro photography. Here is the set up I used below: ( Three lights, two using barn doors and one with out)
Having one light above meant I could highlight the top of the snails shell, along with one of the left and right to light each side of the snail or snails in some cases. It also helped having a shooting table because that also lit up underneath but not as powerful as the rest. Overall I feel todays shoot went well but there is still more to try out and develop on with this on going assignment. Work will be added shortly to the Macro/Microscopy section of the website.