I wanted some product shots for my tiles, and after a bit of research and modicum of pondering, I came up with the fairly safe option of having a tile on a little stand thing (one of those slightly naff little mini easels you can get from craft shops and the like) in the foreground in sharp focus, and behind it, a fetchingly out of focus but suitably arty background. Reasonably well lit and properly exposed, everything should look perfectly nice.
I gathered various props together to feature fuzzily in said background, and put a suitable scenario together. Camera (Fuji x100, if you were curious) on a tripod, f2.8 or f2 to get the shallow depth of field and to handle the slow shutter speed necessary in natural light, (or at least what passes for light this grey, wet winter), macro setting because the x100’s auto focus doesn’t like stuff that close otherwise, tile in foreground, props in background, frame it all up. . . click.
After a bit of trial and error I got it looking OK. Apart from the all too noticeable dent in the ‘floor’. I could photshop that out, if could be bothered 😉 nah, I probably will. But not just now. . .
The dead butterfly, Small Tortoiseshell? was hibernating in our house and didn’t make it through the winter, poor little thing. Still, I have immortalised it in this pic.