How do I take good pics of LONG guns?

I can take decent shoots of handguns but how do I get good ones of rifles.

My camera is a Sony Cyber Shot with a 12x lens. It can take macros 1" or so and of course zoom 12x. Lens is a Carl Zeiss 2,8-3,7/6-72 (don't have a clue what that means)

Usually leave it on idiot mode (manual) it has other settings

My rifle pics usually are on the floor so there is no detail except my toes.

Rule3 said:

My camera is a Sony Cyber Shot with a 12x lens. It can take macros 1" or so and of course zoom 12x. Lens is a Carl Zeiss 2,8-3,7/6-72 (don't have a clue what that means)

Click to expand...

The 2.8-3.7 numbers refer to the lens speed range which changes as you zoom out. The 6-72 refers to the zoom range (72/6 = 12 hence 12x zoom).

I have trouble taking pics of long guns also, but I have seen some good ones here on the forum (Palladin I think) - I believe they are best when outdoors in a shady spot.

My dilemma is not lighting but how to get the whole rifle in the shot without chopping it in half?

I think that you need some distance between the camera and rifle - more distance than between your head and your feet

If you have a deck or porch, try standing on it and pointing the camera down at the rifle. I would suggest a plain background and maybe have the rifle sitting on some small pedestals (small blocks of wood etc) that would not be visible in the photo but would provide some separation between the gun and background.

Not that these are great, but yea ...

- Shooting outside can make it easier.
- Back off, and crop the extra 'stuff' out of the shot.
- As the first image below demonstrates what it looks like when you mess up - remember to stop down enough to get the depth of field you really need. It's a lot further from muzzle to the other end on a rifle than it is on a handgun.

In the front yard:


In the back yard:


6' in front of a black backdrop:


Action shot of a friend sending one:


Self portrait (checking zero):

You have experienced the chalanges in photographing long guns, which include the following:

1. To get the entire rifle, you need to distance the lens sufficently from the subject until you get the entire length of the rifle in the frame. Of course the amount of distance depends on the focal length of your lens, more for longer (Telephoto) lenses and smaller for shorter (wide angle) lenses. Remember that no mater what the focal length of the lens, the actual size of the whole rifle shown in the resulting picture will be about the same - small compared to the overall size of the photo.

2. Because the small size of the object in relation to a standard photo frame (4x6, 4x5 or 8x10), the only way to show the object in grater detail is to increase the size ot the photo - say increasing the frame to 13x20, or to crop the photo to show only part of the rifle while keeping the same photo size. Of course the former fix is not an option when posting the picture on this (or an) Forum.

3. Another problem in any acceptable viewing format is what to do with the extra vertical space in the photo you have when photographing the entire rifle. If you crop the photo to show just the rifle you end up with a very oblong photo.

How you meet these challenges is a personal choice. It helps to see how others resolve these issues by looking at coffee table books and magazines.

Below are some of the approaches I personally like.

I try to arrange the items in the picture to fill out the standard 4x6, 4x5 or 8x10 format as in the in picture of Win. Mod, 1890's below.



If I want to show a rifle in greater detail, I need to crop the rifle and retain the original size as demonstrated by the picture below.



If I want to picture the entire rifle in a single photo, I try to fill additional vertical space with additional objects as illustrated by the picture of the Bullard rifle below.



My preference for rifle pictures is to have a larger partial picture coupled with accessories as illustrated. below.



As I say, how you resolve these challenges is your personal choice. I have not found a single answer to be appropriate in all circumstances.

Long thin things like rifles, shotguns and snakes seem to require lots of megapixels to photograph well. I used to take all my gun pictures with a 4MP camera at a suitable distance and then crop and resize to be web friendly. They always looked a bit blah and I have no idea why. Now I use a 12MP camera and despite being cropped and resized down they look much better. How much of that is starting with more pixels and how much is the newer camera I do not know. I do know that the cameras take comparable close ups.

This is an interesting thread. Several of you have given me some ideas.

Thanks all, Pecos

This is my feeble attempt at photographing my Browning.
I'd find some firearms books or magazines and try to follow their example. Covers of Gun Digest are great.

Practice?

First pic posted on this site.Really cheap,hand-me-down camera.This is one of our stocks.

Man that's a beautiful bit of wood on that thing.

Thanks for the photos and tips. Appears I need to try taking the picture at more of an angle or front to back rather than just "broadside"

I looked at some of my pictures and those came out better. I need a new Photo host site as the the way Photobucket is now, if I crop a picture it does not save it even though I replaced the original and it shows cropped in my album

If you shoot at a extreme angle like front to back, shoot on AP and increase the f-stop to at least f11 or more depending on the length of the gun. The higher the number, the more of the gun that will be in focus.

Here are a couple of links that discuss this.

Understanding Depth of Field in Photography

Online Depth of Field Calculator

I used to stand on a chair and be sure the legs weren't in the picture. I used 35mm or 50mm conventional lenses. I haven't done any digital photos. My favorite camera is the Olympus OM-1n, but I like my Nikon FG, too. I nearly always shoot in Manual mode, to be sure of what I'm getting.

I sold a few photos of rifles propped in a corner of my balcony fence. For them, I sat in a chair some distance away and let the sun illuminate the rifles or used fill-in flash to elminate shadows. My little Yashicamat T-4 Super has a 35mm lens that was "wide" enough to get all of the rifle in the photo. You do have to hold very steady or use a tripod, especially with lower shutter speeds. That small Yashicamat has a retracting Zeiss lens. My other lenses are all by Olympus (Zuiko) or by Nikon.

I'd then put the rifle on a chair with a towel or something as background and take closer up photos of the action, the 'scope, etc. Sometimes, I had to use a candy bar, a flashlight, etc. under the rifle to tip it at the right angle. Of course, that object went under the blanket or cloth under the rifle, to keep it out of sight and keep it from scratching the rifle. (Or shotgun.)

I hope this helps. You can also visit a used book store and look in the photography dept. for books by John Wootters and others on outdoor photography. One of the best is by Sid Latham. Both were master photographers and true wordsmiths. But they wrote before digital cameras were in vogue. Still, most of their tips on posing, lighting, etc. remain valid.

I use a white background... it's a white roll-up vinyl shade from k-mart, etc. It stores very nicely and you can wipe it off if it gets oily.

I usually use a step stool and lean over the rifle, making sure to keep the legs of the stool out of the shot. You can position yourself directly over the rifle this way, especially if the step stool has a tall frame on it... you can lean up against the frame to keep your balance as you focus on the rifle.

Try with a flash and without and see what looks best. Since long guns are long , you just need to crop out some of the white area on the top and bottom of the shot. Since there's so much white in the final shot, you might have to lighten up the photo when you're composing the shot on your computer. I'm talking digital here, not 35mm film.

One thing I do with all firearms shots when using autofocus and auto exposure, is to shoot multiple frames. New AF cameras are really good but nothing is perfect, and can vary slightly from shot to shot.

Digital really shines here as this would waste a lot of film, but there can be a noticeable difference from shot to shot, and it doesn't take long to weed through them with editing software.

If a guy is serious, like LouisianaJoe said, set up your camera for maximum depth of field with a longer exposure and use a tripod to eliminate camera shake. Nothing as challenging as trying to take a pick of a long barreled flinter! As you can see, I did some major cropping, too!

Get a LONG lens...

You could do as I do, just take a lot of pictures and one of them is bound to turn out OK...