Once again a cool product from the innovative company Sphero is in front of the camera. Take a gander at the eye-catching programmable BOLT. This photo assignment came with a bit more challenges than Ollie mainly because the BOLT is encased in a clear sphere that naturally reflects absolutely everything.
After giving it a good try with a fully assembled out-of-the-box BOLT, I realized some X-ACTO surgery was needed to separately shoot the robotic innards and the encompassing clear sphere (don’t try this at home). Removing the sphere also made it infinitely easier to position the BOLT exactly where we needed. What’s special about the BOLT, among many things, is it has a programmable 8×8 light matrix. So, the people at Sphero requested an easily editable layered files to light up the matrix to any design they want. Funny how .gifs are more popular than ever before. Check out the final shots:
To minimize reflections, and have complete control with lighting the robitic innards, we carefully took apart the clear sphere. From there it was all about moving the flashes around to individually light each component. If you look carefully, you can see I tied fishing wire to the white wheels to keep the form correct. Without the pressure from the outer sphere, those wheels splayed outwards. The now hollow ball was used as an example to recreate a cleaner/sharper sphere… then adding back the Sphero logo of course. Take it all apart and piece it back together in Photoshop!
My friend Myles is pretty damn handy with an X-ACTO. Please DO NOT attempt to break apart the BOLT… it works much better, and is more fun, when it’s pieced together, haha. After a trip to the local hobby store, I built a tabletop studio with an overhead softbox. Worked like a charm.
Pictures are cool (biased), but you gotta see the video above to see how this thing rolls. Once again I’m proud to collab with such an innovative company as Sphero. Their products are always making me scratch my head with wonder. If you don’t remember, they are the brains behind the adorable (and functional) Star Wars BB-8… yes, the one from the actual movie (not just the one you can buy). I know I have to push the envelope a bit further when working with the Sphero gang.