The World Of Twilight

Yesterday I had a play trying to take photos of the range for the new book. I've been using one of those portable photography studios (from Amazon, came with a couple of bright lights and a diffuser box type thing) and an EOS550D. I used displays that I've used at shows for years and printed some random scenery off to go in the background.

What do you all think? Do you think they do a reasonable job at showing off the figures? Any suggestions for what I could do to improve them?

Models are painted by Joe and Ben.

(http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh269/Xrgut/939bb276-b108-4c52-acf6-72fa47185b29.jpg) (http://s258.photobucket.com/user/Xrgut/media/939bb276-b108-4c52-acf6-72fa47185b29.jpg.html)
Danakan and Muri meeting a Trader

(http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh269/Xrgut/4c8fb040-6917-44ad-9d3d-03eee429ce64.jpg) (http://s258.photobucket.com/user/Xrgut/media/4c8fb040-6917-44ad-9d3d-03eee429ce64.jpg.html)
Empire Militia

(http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh269/Xrgut/989ae217-96db-4be9-bbf6-a1077d24e1d6.jpg) (http://s258.photobucket.com/user/Xrgut/media/989ae217-96db-4be9-bbf6-a1077d24e1d6.jpg.html)
Random Civilians (mainly because my daughter instructed me to take this photo!)

(http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh269/Xrgut/9fac6e65-3dad-46d9-8700-e12920e42b53.jpg) (http://s258.photobucket.com/user/Xrgut/media/9fac6e65-3dad-46d9-8700-e12920e42b53.jpg.html)
Empire Herders

(http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh269/Xrgut/6963fc87-c70e-4a78-b036-aa837c2a7e50.jpg) (http://s258.photobucket.com/user/Xrgut/media/6963fc87-c70e-4a78-b036-aa837c2a7e50.jpg.html)
Dhogu Warlord

(http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh269/Xrgut/201e7f9c-c05d-40c1-ba3e-18d8a0950412.jpg) (http://s258.photobucket.com/user/Xrgut/media/201e7f9c-c05d-40c1-ba3e-18d8a0950412.jpg.html)
Dhogu Raiders

(http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh269/Xrgut/832460ff-5401-40e1-b610-7aad8880d8cc.jpg) (http://s258.photobucket.com/user/Xrgut/media/832460ff-5401-40e1-b610-7aad8880d8cc.jpg.html)
Grishak!

Like I said on the KS page already, I really like the menacing looking Dhogu Warlord and the Grishak family hunting on the plains.
Apart from these and the meeting of the trader, the rest of the photographs tell little too no story,
So perhaps you can improve a bit in that field.
Like the villagers, they would look a lot more characterful when posed on a market or working in the fields, or even in a tavern after work.
Nevertheless, great job on both the painted miniatures/terrain/photo-editing, very colourful.

Useful thought there - it's a question whether to do the pics as posed unit shots, or try to do more storytelling... I'll have a think!

Quality of photos is good. I like most of them, but agree that varying the backgrounds might be helpful - unless it's prohibitively expensive! Keep up the good work. Counting down the days until the book is ready.

You could of course always 'give' an explanation too them, like: villagers heading too the market or herders searching for a lost enuk.
After giving it some thought, I think the reason the miniatures look posed is because they are on the front and not into the terrain. If you place them inside a forest, put a rock or tent in the front it would probably look more natural and less 'placed' if you know what I mean.
I also wouldn't crowd the picture with miniatures, except if you are doing a distance shot.

edit:
Also, having bases that match the terrain helps them blend in. The grass of the grishak matches this from the plains they are
moving through for example, while the dhogu bases also have grass but the background hasn't any. But this is just a detail.

I will write a little bit of text next to each picture in the book to give some more background.

I'm having to do all these scenes fairly quickly, so making use of what I have to hand! I'll dig through my scenery collection for a few more little bits to see what flavour I can add, while not removing too much space for the figures. I might see if I can find some loose tufts of grass to add to the dhogu scene (but I can't add them permanently as I'm going to need the scene for the Delgon as well!).

The last couple of nights I have been constructing a city scene for the nobles - carving a board of irregularly shaped paving slabs is quite a lot of work, but I think it should look good. I'm looking forward to the next photo shoot now  ;D

Thanks a lot for the constructive comments!

Can't wait to see this new terrain.  A sneak peak perhaps ;).

Looking good mate...the only thing I'd say is that the sky looks a little bright for twilight. Though it must be tricky to shoot without making the photos look badly lit.