HomePod

Apple’s newest product, the HomePod, is quintessential Apple industrial design: minimal as it can be while still having corporeal form. Given that last fact, I decided it would be the perfect product for a contrived little room scene. You know the one: everything perfectly arranged with tasteful design that only exists in a Restoration Hardware catalogue.

As it happened I had access to a nice looking set the weekend the HomePod launched, so all I had to do was show up make it look good and click away.

Unfortunately, I am not a prop stylist. I can get away with a tabletop set and some books, but propping a whole room (especially when you don’t have a whole room’s worth of props) turns out to be a little tricky. I fought the exceedingly minimal industrial loft style for quite some time before deciding to pull the plug and try for an even more minimal style.

I still wanted the hard light from the room scene, but instead of long shadows from a simulated late-in-the-day sun I kept the shadow small and close.

Retouching

I always find it fun peel back the base layer of any photo to see all that was done to it.¹

Most of the work went into cleaning up all of the damage on the painted stripe in the foam core. Only a hint of the negative fill was needed to add some separation on the left edge.