Merging layers, recovering original tones

[anthony]

Looks good very professional.

[imagebloko]

Thanks, it's come out well considering it is mostly built from scraps.

My biggest worry at the moment are the lights - and compensating for the barrel distortion in the cheap A495 Canon cameras.

One of the issues is bringing out the "curve" in the aluminium profile which is being photographed. If the light is too diffuse, or strong/direct, then it becomes visually "flattened".

On the otherhand, if the lights are too much like spot lights (as they currently are) I wonder if that is going to have a negative affect on the image processing (as where the light is strongest the quality of the "black" background will be moved quite far into the grey/white) ?

I'm going to meet with a photographer friend on Thursday to try to setup the lights and cameras in a way that will result in the most photogenic results... any input/warnings/suggestions you have before we fix the positions of the lights/cameras are most welcome.

[imagebloko]

So, it turned out that - due to the different surfaces, and types of glass etc. in the profile, it is simply not possible to get a setup with produces a really good image for all the different profile configurations.

Furthermore, the spots are too intense and too close

We're making a few alterations to shine the spots on a diffuser (located on the opposite side to the each set of lights) to create a less impressive but more predictable illumination.

If that works out then I'll upload some pictures... but I'm getting the feeling this is going to be mission impossible.

[anthony]

Don't give up.

I was going to suggest diffusers at some point as your initial photos did seem to have strong spots.
some larger spots on a diffuser further away may give better overall.