This photo is an homage to a keepsake I have had for many years. It is an empty perfume bottle from my grandmother’s effects after she died in my childhood. Judging from the label, it was not an expensive brand. Nor is the bottle likely to be of particular value. But it’s important to me. It’s at least 40 years old because that’s how long I have it. It might be Depression era at the oldest, but I have no way of knowing how long my grandmother had it.
I lit this bottle with a strong LED flashlight in dimly lit room. The flashlight is underneath the bottom of the bottle. A table lamp is at my shoulder, casting the light in the label. In post-processing I removed some evidence of the housing of the flashlight underneath. I also dodged the labels to lighten it up to see them better. I sharpened it some. The most radical post-process was to apply correction for color balancing to tungsten. No tungsten lights were used. I just like the color cast it gave the glass of the bottle. It looks more glasslike than the rather plain window-glass colorlessness of the original. My goal here was to show the bottle in the most flattering light. I am fighting the age of the bottle. The label is no longer perfect. There is a good bit of dust or perhaps dried perfume residue inside the bottle. There’s not much I can do about that, and I did not want to remove too much character any way. A little boost from white balance is enough; it can stand on its own from there.
The camera is the Nikon D90; the lens is the Nikon 18-55mm AF-S VR DX. Everything was hand held, with assist from Vibration Reduction. No flash was used. 1600 ISO, f/5.6 and 1/40 sec; 55mm focal length. Very little crop here; the 18-55mm focused closely on it own. The grain at this high ISO is pretty good this image size.
UPDATE: A google search turned up a reference for a similar bottle, indicating a circa 1930s date.
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