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Hi guys. Quick question. What is the best type of light bulb to get for taking photos of minitures? Wal mart has soft white, a day light bulb, etc. my current lamp lights give off a yellow tint to the photos I take. I'm looking for something that's going to keep it white and true colors.

Daylight bulbs, as bright as you can get and several of them (front light, top light, light on each side) to remove shadows.

It doesn't actually matter too much, so long a your camera has white balance adjustment. I use halogen lamps, because it's what I have.

It is possible to use color correction, but it if you are buying lights you may as well get full spectrum ones.

One place that some cameras fail is exposure. They can be fooled by bright white backgrounds making the exposure shorter. Unfortunately, the miniature can end up being too dark, even with the white background. The solution on a slr camera is to set the exposure. On other cameras, you can try to set the exposure when you are zoomed in on the figure, and then zoom out and take the picture.

As others have said the type of bulb doesn't really matter as long as you use the correct white balance setting. Where you'll run into real trouble is if you're mixing different light sources. If you have a tungsten bulb in your ceiling light and using a halogen lamp as well you won't really be able to avoid weird colours. So, whatever type of bulb you're using try to use only that type of bulb.

Of course, the other solution is to not use a white background

Light blue generally works quite well, and I get reasonable results with grey.

If you don't have the white balance right it will distort your colours no matter what your background is.

Personally, I like shooting miniatures on a pure white background (bristol board works perfectly). There are plenty of tutorials for making your own light box. It's dirt cheap and it works great.

Thanks guys for the help. I am going to make me a light box to help out with it. I need to get me a quality camera then it sounds like so I can mess with exposure and white balance. I have been borrowing a family members camera and dont know how to do all that on it and dont want to mess it up for when she uses it. i use my iPhone when I did not have it. Can good results happen with an iPhone 4S, light box, and day light bulbs to hold until I can get one?

 spaceelf wrote:
It is possible to use color correction, but it if you are buying lights you may as well get full spectrum ones.

One place that some cameras fail is exposure. They can be fooled by bright white backgrounds making the exposure shorter. Unfortunately, the miniature can end up being too dark, even with the white background. The solution on a slr camera is to set the exposure. On other cameras, you can try to set the exposure when you are zoomed in on the figure, and then zoom out and take the picture.

Yup... My meager photo experience worked best when i figured out how to tweak the white balance setting on my relatively ancient (2005-2006?) Canon G6 and used two cheap $10 clip-on 'reading lights' as the light sources. My girlfriend got me a mini-photo-studio, but I think I need to get good bulbs for it as it never seems to work as well.

I have recently purchased from my local hobby lobby something they call a "natural light" bulb ... it has helped out my photos a lot.

 Talarn Blackshard wrote:
I have recently purchased from my local hobby lobby something they call a "natural light" bulb ... it has helped out my photos a lot.

Was yours turning yellow also?

As a self confessed layman on the topic I can't really comment too much on types of lightbulb but can show you what I achieved with a table lamp with a 60w bulb, Ikea desk lamp (energy saving bulb not sure about the bulb) and a home made light box (3 sides with white tissue paper windows and a black tissue paper background).

Set up thus;



I managed to do this;



which was a vast improvement on this;



Not perfect by any means but some idea what can be done in 5 minutes with a couple of domestic lights, an iPhone and an idiot in control.

A softbox or reflector is what you want; there are tutorials aplenty for both (the reflector will be easier).

Kal-El wrote:
Thanks guys for the help. I am going to make me a light box to help out with it. I need to get me a quality camera then it sounds like so I can mess with exposure and white balance. I have been borrowing a family members camera and dont know how to do all that on it and dont want to mess it up for when she uses it. i use my iPhone when I did not have it. Can good results happen with an iPhone 4S, light box, and day light bulbs to hold until I can get one?

This photo was taken with an iPhone 4s, day-light bulbs and a light gray background. The main challenge I had with an iPhone was getting it to focus on what I wanted to be in focus.

My photos on dakka may be horrible (I'm limited to the camera on my stone age phone) - so I don't try very hard in regards to lighting them - but I work in movie lighting, and can tell you there is no best bulb. Color doesn't really matter either - but avoid CFL's, as they will almost always have a green shift in them. For bright miniatures photography you want broad soft light all over everything (assuming you're shooting a white cyc and not a diorama). On the cheap, I'd recommend a pair of silver dish reflector lights from home depot. Place those frontal, criss crossing the miniature, and a small fluorescent light above and somewhat behind the miniature. Remember, if something's too bright, just scooting it back to lower the intensity.

While there's no best bulb, for the dish lights I'd certainly recommend frosted globes. Clears cast nasty shadows from the filament inside.

 albinoork wrote:
This photo was taken with an iPhone 4s, day-light bulbs and a light gray background. The main challenge I had with an iPhone was getting it to focus on what I wanted to be in focus.

That's one reason I keep my old Canon G6 handy. It's got a great macro mode, something most phones don't cater to. I can also tweak the white balance if I'm using a white backdrop to avoid the issues with a white backdrop making everything yellow-ish.

I just replaced the bulbs in my basement office/studio area with some daylight bulbs. need to try some photos down there...

Bulb/lightsource does matter. White balance doesn't solve everything because of the flicker cycle you can have a wide range of issues when it comes to color. WB can help but consistency is hard to come by if shooting at high shutter speeds. Try and shoot 1/60th of a second or less, at that point you can mitigate some of the issues and get a more consistent color. Also if your camera can shoot raw that may help with wiggle room on the color side of things. Also, try and avoid sodium vapor, fluorescent and mercury vapor light sources. Those are the biggest culprits.

great feedback thank you guys.

I used to use a pair of can lights* - one with a cyan gel and one with a salmon gel.

Mind you, that was because I used to run lights for a folk music group, and had the lights....

The Auld Grump

*These were real can lights - black oven paint over Chock Full of Nuts cans....