Half Guitar Body

For this picture, I was inspired by this shot. That guitar has a dark border which makes a really nice effect in the picture. My guitar doesn't have that, instead, it has a really nice woods and also this guitar is very special to me so taking a picture of it was motivating.

Here's the setup:

We had some lighting issues. First, the background wasn't black enough because the guitar is resting on the guitar stand at an angle. So I had to point the camera downward to be straight on the guitar but that meant I was also pointing at my very light floors. We blocked a bit of the light from the flash+umbrella with the chair. We then used some coats and a curtain to cover my floor and that helped.

Lighting the guitar without reflections was also tricky. Adding the reflector helped a bit but I wish I wouldn't have to do as much in post to have the picture I wanted. I think having a big lighting box would be nice. I should try to make one.

This was shot with my Fujifilm X-T20 + Rokinon 50mm 1.2. This is out of camera raw with Lightroom presets (Adobe Color):

I increased the exposure, whites, clarity, and contrast. I lowered the highlights a bit. The rest is done with the brush tool. I brushed the black area to make sure it's really black and then parts of the guitar to make it brighter. I didn't touch the HSL but I did spend a lot of time with the whitebalance to get the color I wanted.

50mm 1/160s F/8 ISO 100

Taking pictures of the things you love is a great way to have fun with photography. You'll be much more interested in your subject. You'll also be harder on yourself which isn't bad because you want a good shot. Just don't be too hard, sometimes it might not work on the first try.