Ever looked at an image and wondered how on earth the photographer managed to pull it off? I do it all the time, so I decided not to wonder any more and try it myself. That's how I ended up getting this image of what seems like a floating, balancing tower of delicious macarons!
Believe it or not this image didn't take very long to set-up shoot and edit, mainly because I had forgotten to charge my camera batteries and my kids were hanging to eat the macarons so I had no time to set-up any lights like I had planned. But I had promised that my boys could eat them after this so I felt like I had committed. In this post I will give you all the pointers including the equipment I used, where I purchased everything, and how I achieved this image, so keep scrolling if you want to try it out!!
Bear in mind this may not even be the most effective way to get this type of image, but is there ever really a right way? (Probably, but if you get there in the end does it matter?).
What you need:
A camera
Tripod (not essential but very helpful)
Coloured background. (this background is actually a Piece of A2 card from office works, around $3-4 but you could get card from any craft shop.)
A packet of macarons or any biscuit you want to stack. (Coles $8)
A packet of wooden bbq skewers (Coles $2).
A piece of white cardboard or foam core board (officeworks between $5-$9)
maybe sticky tape (I'll explain)
A small box (or shoebox) for propping the skewer.
one extra hand (not essential but very helpful!)
Photoshop or the like for a smidge of editing.
The set-up:
For this image I pushed a small table up next to a window in our living room, I propped up the card. Now I used some clamps and right angle brackets that I purchased from bunnings, along with a box to sit behind the card to stop it from bowing, but you could use anything you like to keep it up, keep it as upright as possible though.
Next I got a skewer and carefully pierced each of the macarons first laying flat and then through the filling to create a pattern, I purposely didn't put the same colour twice in a row just as a personal choice as I thought it would look nicer. These are very delicate biscuits so my biggest advice is go slowly when piercing the macarons and once you pick a spot to pierce commit! I tried using a piece of foam that stores my paint brushes but ti was too light and kept over balancing so I gave up on that and placed a shoe box underneath the skewer and held it from the top. Looking back I would have found something to hold the foam down so I had a free hand as a couldn't place the foam core to reflect the light from the window. My son did come in handy though as he ended up holding the top of the skewer for me for me to take the photo at which stage I completely forgot about the reflector! Watch out for sliding, I found putting some sticky tape under the bottom macaron helps. I took a few photos and then wouldn't you know it, my battery died!!
Post Production
Next is the post production, first it was into adobe RAW for some basic adjustments. I upped the contrast and shadows, sharpened, and made a curve adjustment. Now into Photoshop, I cropped the image and duplicated the image then I flipped the copy vertically and painted out the hand, skewer and shoe box. I then went through and touched up the blemishes that I found distracting, there were a couple of spots where I could just see the skewer between biccies. In hindsight I should have taken a photo of the background on it's own, this would have made the editing alot easier. I learned that you really don't need a lot of fancy equipment, you can use anything from around the house. But at the end of it all I was really happy with the image, even though I had a plan I still had to think on my feet. Sometimes what you plan and the actual results are completely different, the trick is to roll with it, it may just result in something you love!! Thanks for looking at this short and sweet (pun intended) tutorial,if you have any questions or if you have a go at this I would love to see your final images, just post in the comments!! Until next time! Bron.