Beertography | Breaking Down a Subject

There are many concepts in photography to learn, so many in fact, that it can be overwhelming. I find that breaking them down to core elements helps me to better understand them. It's my way of keeping things simple. For instance, the core elements of exposure are shutter speed, aperture and ISO. Color, quality and direction are elements found in every light source. When it comes to subjects, they can be broken down to distinct visual components; shape, form and color.

Shape & Form:

Shape is an element that helps to define a subject. You can think of it as your subjects outline. It's found in everything you photograph; people, landscapes, objects...and of course, beer. In beertography, your subject is often a bottle, a can or a perfectly poured beer and it's your job to define the shape and bring out the form. Two techniques that I find simple and effective are backlighting and rim lighting. In this post I will describe how I use these techniques to define shape, reveal form and highlight color of our subject.

Image 1a

Backlighting is a technique when your main light source is behind your subject and it does an excellent job defining an outline. The source can be the sun, ambient light, speedlights or studio strobes. The image captured will often be a silhouette, such as in Image 1a. However, it does nothing to reveal form. Form is another element that makes up a subjects visual component and can be thought of as the three-dimensional qualities of a subject.

Image 1b

In order to reveal form, I rely on front or side lighting. In this case, I simply bounced some light back into the bottle by using a white foamboard reflector. The result can be seen in Image 1b. The reflector has done a fair job of introducing some light to the label as well as a reflection to the upper left side of the bottle. It's the reflection and the intensity of light across the label that starts to convey the cylindrical shape of the bottle.

Image 1c

The label is still to dark and the reflection needs to be brighter. I placed a silver reflector to the right of the bottle and the result can be seen in Image 1c. That bounced a significant amount of light into the label as well as into the white reflector. Now the label is well exposed and the reflection on the upper left side of the bottle is more visible. You can also see the reflection of the silver reflector in the right shoulder of the bottle.

As you can see, backlighting does a great job of defining shape, but needs front and side lighting to reveal form.

Image 1d

The setup shot shows the positioning of the reflectors. The direction of the sun is from left to right in the image and bounced back into the bottle by the reflectors. The white reflector is 10" x 30" white foamboard clamped on to a microphone stand. The silver reflector is a 22" multi disc 5-in-1 also clamped to a mic stand.








Rim Lighting is a technique used to outline a subject with a line of light to emphasize shape. Often used in portrait photography as a "hair light" to outline the shape of the head and create some separation with the background. I use it in beertography the same way typically when my subject is front or side lit. Again, the source can be natural or artificial lighting and in this example I used the sun as my source with a diffusion panel to soften the light.

Image 2a

As you can see in Image 2a, the sun does a nice job job lighting the label, but the right side of the image is rather dark making it difficult to see the right edge of the bottle. The left side of the bottle could use a little more definition and the surface could be brighter.

When I have a situation like this, dark bottle on a dark background I like to use rim lighting to define the shape. For me the keys to rim lighting are placement and power output of your rim light source.

Image 2b

In Image 2b, I placed a silver reflector behind and to the right of the bottle in order to bring out the edge on the right side. The silver reflector kicks out a lot of light and placing it behind the bottle gives you an angle to light mostly the edge. It does take minor adjusting to get that strip of light just right. To vary the power you could move the reflector closer to increase it or back it off to decrease it. With the right edge taken care of I move on to address the left edge.

Image 2c

I did the same thing to bring out the left edge. I placed a silver reflector behind and to the left of the bottle and that added a strip of light on the left shoulder of the bottle and on the left side of the label. As you can see, it also did a nice job of adding more light to the surface. Now that the shape has been defined and the surface made brighter, I focus on bringing out a little more form.

Image 2d

In Image 2d, I added a white reflector to the right of the bottle. This placed a reflection along the neck, shoulder and body giving the bottle a little bit more dimension.

Rim lighting can be very useful in defining a subjects shape and has the added benefit of creating separation form the background as well as contributing to depth and dimension to the overall image.

Image 2e

In the setup shot you can see the positioning of the reflectors. Sun light direction is from left to right in the image and bounced back into the bottle by the reflectors. The silver reflector on the table is a white foamboard wrapped in tin foil clamped to a small lighting stand.











Color:

Color is the final element in breaking down a subjects visual components. The color of beer ranges from the pale straw color of a Witbier to a jet-black Russian Imperial Stout and all sorts of colors in between. When poured into a glass you can use color to define shape.

Image 3a

Front lit beer pours can be problematic. Images often look flat and lifeless. While it does a good job of lighting the head it can at times do a poor job of defining the shape of the glassware and it does nothing to highlight the wonderful color of the beer such as in Image 3a. This is an easy fix...bring in some backlighting.  

Image 3b

Placing a silver reflector behind and to the left of the glassware solves our problem. First, it adds light to the background which helps define the edge of the glassware. Second, it bounces light into the body of the beer producing an inviting beer glow. Lastly, it reveals texture in the surface and creates depth and dimension to the overall image.

Image 3c

Backlit beer pours are generally easier to deal with. There is good contrast between the beer and background which results in clearly defining the glassware. The beer comes to life by highlighting the color. You will probably need to address the beer head as it may be a little underexposed. This again is an easy fix. Simply use a reflector to bounce some light back into the head as in Image 3c.

When properly lit, color can be used to define shape effectively.




The subject in photography is just as important as understanding exposure, lighting and composition. It's the reason you stopped to photograph it. As craft beer lovers we know our subject from a consumers perspective and I hope this has given you some insight into it's visual components as well as some simple techniques to emphasize them.