For this photo, I wanted to feature my life-size resin skull in a “Film Noir” influenced environment. I grabbed an old Fedora, a cigarette and some incense, for the props and atmosphere.

I used a Nikon d850 with a Nikon 70-200mm f2.8 lens. Manual mode, 180mm, f5.6, 1/250 of a second and ISO 100. It was lit with a Godox soft box, with a Godox V860ii flash.

The biggest challenge while shooting this was to get a “good capture” of the incense/smoke, as the cigarette continued to burn down. Fortunately this was captured more towards the start, as the cigarette still has a decent amount of length left.