SOTD – Sunday 30 September 2018

  • Safety Razor: Yaqi – RAG1804 Gunmetal
  • Blade: Polsilver – Super Iridium
  • Shaving Brush: Yaqi – Tuxedo – 24mm Bulb (Synthetic)
  • Shaving Bowl: Saponificio Varesino – Faux Horn Bowl
  • Shaving Soap: Tcheon Fung Sing – Vecchia Torino
  • After-Shave: Tcheon Fung Sing – Vecchia Torino

SOTD – Thursday 27 September 2018

  • Safety Razor: Parker – Variant Graphite
  • Blade: Polsilver – Super Iridium
  • Shaving Brush: Mozingo Brushworks – Raven’s Flight – Tuxedo – 24mm Bulb (Synthetic)
  • Shaving Soap: Stirling Soap – Vanilla Sandalwood
  • After-Shave: Storybook Soapworks – Visions and Revisions

SOTD – Monday 24 September 2018

  • Safety Razor: Merkur – Progress (50C)
  • Blade: Perma-Sharp – Super
  • Shaving Brush: Saponificio Varesino – Faux Horn 2.0 – 27mm Fan (High Mountain White)
  • Shaving Bowl: Saponificio Varesino – Shaving Grail Bowl
  • Shaving Soap: Saponificio Varesino – Mirto di Sardegna – Beta 4.3
  • After-Shave: Saponificio Varesino – Mirto di Sardegna

SOTD – Sunday 23 September 2018

  • Safety Razor: Above The Tie – SE1
  • Blade: Feather – Super Professional
  • Shaving Brush: Yaqi – Sagrada Familia – 24mm Bulb (Synthetic)
  • Shaving Cream: Saponificio Bignoli – Agrumi Del Mediterraneo
  • Fragrance: Rebul – Mandarine

SOTD – Saturday 22 September 2018

  • Safety Razor: Charcoal Goods – Level 1 Bishop
  • Blade: Polsilver – Super Iridium
  • Shaving Brush: Morris & Forndran – 1XL – 24mm Bulb (Blonde Badger)
  • Shaving Soap: Chiseled Face – Panda
  • Fragrance: Zoologist – Panda (Sample)

SOTD – Friday 21 September 2018

  • Straight Razor: Saponificio Varesino – Leonardo da Vinci – Custom Koraat 6/8
  • Shaving Brush: Dogwood Handcrafts – Malachor Hybrid – 26mm Fan (Silvertip Badger)
  • Shaving Soap: Barrister & Mann – Reserve Lavender
  • After-Shave: Barrister & Mann – Reserve Lavender

SOTD – Thursday 20 September 2018

  • Safety Razor: Wolfman Razors – WR1 .67 OC WRH2 polished handle
  • Blade: Polsilver – Super Iridium
  • Shaving Brush: Declaration Grooming – Elite Black Ash Burl LE B5 – 26mm Fan (Select Badger)
  • Shaving Bowl: Saponificio Varesino – Shaving Grail Bowl
  • Shaving Soap: Declaration Grooming – Pure Lavender
  • After-Shave: Barrister & Mann – Reserve Lavender

SOTD – Sunday 16 September 2018

  • Safety Razor: Timeless Razor – Closed Comb – 0.68mm – 100mm Barber Pole
  • Blade: Polsilver – Super Iridium
  • Shaving Brush: RazoRock – 400 – Aluminium – 24mm Bulb (Synthetic)
  • Shaving Bowl: Saponificio Varesino – Shaving Grail Bowl
  • Shaving Soap: Stirling Soap – Barbershop
  • After-Shave: Stirling Soap – Barbershop
  • Fragrance: Rebul – Dark Spice

SOTD – Saturday 15 September 2018

  • Safety Razor: Charcoal Goods – Level 1 Bishop
  • Blade: Polsilver – Super Iridium
  • Shaving Brush: Dogwood Handcrafts – Abyss – 26mm Bulb (Silvertip Badger)
  • Shaving Soap: Barrister & Mann – Seville In Reserve
  • After-Shave: Barrister & Mann – Seville In Reserve

SOTD in the making

Some of you guys wanted to see how I create my SOTD pictures. In general, I take two different styles of shots, one involves using a LED cube for high key shots and the other involves taking a series of shots in the dark with a method called light painting and later merging those shots into one.

After merging I use software to enhance the picture to make it shine and pop.
Below I have tried to put together a 10-step walkthrough to let you in on my secrets.

  1. Used equipment
    1.  Hardware
      1.     Canon 60D
      2.     Canon kit lens EF-S 18-55mm
      3.     Hähnel Giga T Pro II wireless remote trigger set replaced by Hähnel Captur Timer Kit
      4.     Manfrotto tripod
      5.     iPhone 8 with “Light Paint” app
    2.   Software
      1.     Adobe Lightroom CC Classic
      2.     Adobe Photoshop CC
      3.     Nik Collection
  2. Choosing the shaving gear
  3.   Stage the scene
  4. Setup the camera, focus on the objects one by one, go to manual focus and go into dark mode (i.e. in this shot I first did step 4 and 5 for the splash, then 4 and 5 for the brush, etc., etc.)
  5. Use the iPhone as a light source to paint in the light with the “Light Paint” app, using the full white screen on highest brightness setting, whilst the camera is in Bulb mode, which I trigger with the remote trigger.
  6. Repeat step 4 and 5 until you have enough good lighted pictures of all the objects
  7. Clean up the table. (yup…OCD)
  8. Post processing
    1.     Lightroom CC
      1. Import the pictures into LR
      2. Set the lens profile and sync this across all photos
      3. With all pictures selected, export this to Photoshop as layers
    2. Photoshop CC
      1. Select all layers and auto-align them
      2. Sort the layers and color label them to remind myself which layers are focussing on what objects. The colors are randomly chosen.
      3. With layer masks, paint in the portions you want from all layers
      4. Make sure you go through every layer mask and make sure there is no light spill
      5. Flatten the image
      6. Crop the image so there is no more transparent space visible again
      7. Use the healing brush in different ways to correct blemishes/dust/particles/flaws
      8. Save and quit to LR, remove all other images and use the merged image in next steps
    3. Nik Collection
      1.  Export to RAW Presharpener for extra sharpness
      2.  Export to Dfine to remove noise
      3.  Export to Viveza 2 for colour corrections
      4.  Export to Color Effex Pro 4 for extra contrast
    4. Lightroom CC
      1. Use the brush tool to do the final touches for clarity, contrast and saturation
      2. Scale, rotate, crop
      3. the file, save and export
    5. Before
    6. After
  9. Post to social media
  10. Done

SOTD – Wednesday 12 September 2018

  • Straight Razor: J.A. Henckels – Friodur – 72
  • Shaving Brush: Dogwood Handcrafts & Declaration Grooming – B5 – LavRonze – 24mm Fan (Select Badger)
  • Shaving Bowl: Saponificio Varesino – Shaving Grail Bowl
  • Shaving Cream: Castle Forbes – Lavender

SOTD – Tuesday 11 September 2018

  • Straight Razor: Koraat – 6/8 Full Hollow Ivory Snake Yuma
  • Shaving Brush: Declaration Grooming – Jefferson Vastness LE B4 – 27mm Fan (Select Badger)
  • Shaving Soap: Storybook Soapworks – Visions and Revisions
  • After-Shave: Storybook Soapworks – Visions and Revisions