Got into the kids' toys today. I have two daughters - five, and one and a half - and they have the coolest toys! There's a lot of girly stuff in there, but they've inherited a lot of my old toys as well. Beauty part of it all is, I can play with the kids and shoot some spectacular photos of toys at the same time.
Anyway, there are TONS of plastic animals, lots of Barbies (w/all the accessories), a great deal of dinosaurs, Disney characters and stuffed animals galore. Not to mention farm sets, castles, trucks and race cars, pretend food and much, much more. Their collection is a perfect ready-to-go arsenal of materials for the type of photography that I enjoy the most, as I'm sure is immediately apparent by looking at my photos. I intend to make obscene amounts of money doing this someday. Did I mention that all my works are for sale?
You too can harness the incredible creative power of toy photography - or just waste time and rip off toy companies by taking pictures of their licensed products. Whatever - you decide your own destiny. I know you're dying to learn the secrets of this ancient artform. Here's a step by step guide on how to do it:
a) Pick up any toy that you have in your home. Action figures work best for this exercise. If you have no action figures in your home, I feel sorry for you, because you're probably so homophobic that you're worried that someone would call you a sissy if you did. Seriously though, anything with eyes will do. Look into those toy eyes and think about that toy - think about what that toy is seeing through those eyes. What's it thinking? If he/she/it could speak to you, what would it say? What would its voice sound like? Some would be easy like Darth Vader or Batman, or some other clearly-defined fictional character in toy form. The ones that are difficult are the generics, like cheap plastic dinosaurs or the super cutesy Littlest Pet Shop figs. You really have to work on getting into their heads. Let the goals and aspirations of that doll inspire you. If you succeed, you are a mad genius. Just try not to let anyone see you doing this. It's just not that cool. If you get busted, you could always say you were masturbating.
b) Put the aforementioned toy (hereby referred to as 'Toy A') next to another toy ('Toy B'). Try to make the two as different as possible. (Mickey Mouse + Spawn = sweet combo) More often than not, you're going for comedy, so the more ridiculous the better. It's called juxtaposition. Look it up if you don't believe me. Oh, and there doesn't have to be just two toys either. I have dozens of Ewoks from the Star Wars Miniatures game, and I'm scouting out some good co-stars for them.
c) Toy A and Toy B need some life. This is where all that touchy-feely "be one with the toy" crap from part a) comes in. How do they see each other? Are these toys enemies? Newfound friends? What would they do together, or seperately (but in the same photograph of course)? I realize that Disney/Pixar covered a lot of this stuff in Toy Story 1 and 2, but that was all sugary kids' stuff. What's the real dirt on these toys? That's what we're after.
d) Props are key. Not 100% essential, but they can really make it all work. One fun thing to do is go to a second-hand or dollar store and pick up the most obscure miniature items you can find (tiny swords, cameras, suitcases, frying pans, furniture, guns, dinnerware, yada, yada). Sometimes you can get a baggie of cool odds & ends for a buck. They don't even need to be toys, and they don't need to be exactly to scale with the figures. Consider this: "Man, that's one huge (gun/banana/mug of beer) in Spider-man's hand. Why is he looking at Strawberry Shortcake like that? And what's he doing with his other hand?" This is the frame of mind you should be in when setting up the shots. (Weirdo.)
Okay, so there's a few tips on working with toys for photoshoots. I think you'll find that they are some of the most patient and obedient models out there. I haven't had to fire one yet. If you were looking for, like, technical tips on what lenses or apertures or lighting to use, you're not going to get those here. Sorry that's just not my bag. Try Ken Rockwell maybe.
Hope you learned something other than the fact that I don't get out much. Take care.
May the Force be with you...
