When you have the chance to photograph a rare bottle of whiskey, how can you refuse the offer?

This month we did a shoot in a more classic fashion. I wanted to add texture and elegance to the bottle, which would elevate its beauty even further. As I wanted a very clean look in the bottle and the glass, I decided to photograph each product separately and combine them afterwards in Photoshop.

For the light setup, I placed one broncolor Picolite with a Fresnel Spot above the background, pointing down onto the product to create long shadows and add texture to the wooden underground. I chose to use the Fresnel Spot over a honeycomb because it allowed me to focus my spot and create a vignette-like effect on the wooden underground. To fill in the shadows and add some reflections to the top of the bottle and glass, I hung a broncolor Siros 800 S with a broncolor Softbox over the setup. Additionally, I positioned two Siros 800 S with the broncolor L40 standard reflector equipped with a honeycomb grid, on the left-hand side of the camera. One of the lights was pointing to the background to create a soft gradient behind the products. The other light pointed to the right edge of the wooden underground to add some additional depth. As I was looking for soft reflections in the bottle and glass, I decided to put a diffusion panel on the right side of the setup and placed another Siros 800 S right behind it.

As I mentioned in the beginning, I decided to photograph both products separately, as they both needed slightly different setups and I wanted to avoid the glass creating reflections on the bottle. For the bottle shot, I placed an L40 standard reflector with a honeycomb grid on the Siros 800 S behind my diffusion panel. This created a soft gradient on the upper part of the bottle. I was still missing some highlights on the left side of the bottle. To create this, I first placed a white wall on the left side of the bottle. Then, I pointed a second Picolite with a projector attachment to this wall and used the metal templates to shape my light and add shine.

Later, I took the bottle, the white wall and the Picolite out of the setup and positioned the glass. I wanted to create a slightly different reflection in the glass. Therefore, I decided to exchange the L40 & honeycomb grid combination on the Siros 800 S behind the diffusion panel and instead use the Softbox 30 x 120. This created a longer and harder reflection in the glass. I then positioned the Picolite with the projector attachment above the drink and again used the metal templates to only shine on the drink and not the area around it. To finish it off, I used a third Picolite with a small honeycomb grid to brighten the background behind the glass.

For the second shot, the light setup stayed quite the same as in the bottle shot.

Thanks you for your interest in my work. See you in the new year!