Because you might have missed his great posts the first time around, we’re republishing some of Jim’s greatest hits here on Tuesday and Thursdays.

I’ve been having a great time with the Year of Color 2 challenge on Flickr (click here)!

Every week Happythings, with suggestions from the group of 400+ participants, select a 2-color theme and we all scurry off to take a photo to describe the colors.

This week’s colors are “red + yellow” and I’ve managed to do a few shots (unlike some weeks where time constraints make it hard to get one in on time and “time” being a very important consideration..).

This is a very enjoyable way to keep sharp, practice different techniques in a more relaxing way than when on assignment.

Yes, you still have a deadline (End of Saturday) and a specific description (red+yellow), but how you accomplish that, it’s all up to you.

Well, I finally remembered to save a set-up shot of my most recent shot and I’ll share the technique I used for the photo.

This is the set-up I used for my photo titled “Chez Riri” (above).

I wanted to give the effect of sitting at an outdoor café in Paris while focusing on the red+yellow colors of the ashtray.

Lacking the time and money to fly to Paris (no matter how much I’d like to!), I figured I’d set it up in the master-bedroom to take advantage of the afternoon sun.

Since the background wasn’t a very “identifiable” part of the photo, I used a book I had on Paris. Had this been a paying-assignment or if it was more identifiable I would have used one of my photos from my photo-library.

I then placed a couple of books on the floor and placed an IKEA placemat on top of the books (I love going thru IKEA and other stores and picking up placemats as background elements of my shots).

This represented the typical aluminum-tabletop made famous in sidewalk cafés everywhere.

I then placed my red&yellow ashtray on top of the placemat and focused in with my D200 and Nikon 50mm 1.8 lens (I just love this lens!).

I snapped a couple of shots with the sun providing all the lighting I needed.

As the shot looked a little plain with just the ashtray, I added a few French-francs and a glass of “Pernod” on ice to the scene (note: no Pernod was harmed or wasted in the taking of this photo.).

I made sure the reflections of the “table” weren’t shining on the “Parisian background”.

A little framing through the viewfinder and “Voila”, I had my red+yellow shot and a glass of Pernod to boot!