While reflective products take a lot of time to set-up the result is worth it. These very small hand tools have a beautiful brushed and reflective finish. Multiple soft boxes with controllable Aperture lights combined with light modifiers to bounce and direct the light retained the beauty of the finish minus the hotspots. Canon’s EF100mm f/2.8 Macro IS USM lens captures the detail and allows aperture to control the bokeh in the foreground and background.
This catalog of watch bands was shot on a white background using light modifiers, soft boxes and shot with Canon’s EF100mm Macro IS USM Lens. The above layout is created from multiple shots. Below is one layout the client requested to group like products.
Individual shots of watch bands.
A simple layout styling.
This industrial photography project took two onsite sessions, and large acrylic products were also shot onsite using a white background, multiple soft boxes and light modifiers and shot with the Canon 24-70mm lens. The small precision hand tools were shot inhouse on white. The bokeh “hero shots” for the small tools were shot inhouse using a Canon EF100mm Macro IS USM Lens.
Reflective surfaces like acrylic and stainless steel require a lot of prep and set-up. Products must be thoroughly clean of fingers, dust and dirt.
The brushed stainless-steel finish had a beautiful warmth.
One cabinet’s interior (below) is stainless steel. The angle was the focal point for the customer, controlling the light made this shot beautiful.
The Hero Shots (ie bokeh) time for set-up is with both lighting due to the reflective surfaces and arranging the products for balance and visually attraction.
Once again, the brushed stainless steel required additional lighting. Due to the number of tools creating the depth of the bokeh needed extra time.
These micro tools are less than 3 inches each.
Food product photography is fascinating. Take a pile of grains, seeds or powder and find the best arrangement of the pile. How to sprinkle just the right amount of spread, where to stop the bulk of product and control powder spillage is critical. Stacking the chunky ingredients begins with balancing the chunks, then rearranging to create the visual look of the interesting sides and of course the crumbs. It takes a fair amount of time to get some test shots for the client to choose from. There is a beauty in ingredients!
Equipment Used:
Canon 5d Mark III
Canon Macro Lens EF100mm f/2.8
Multiple Softboxes
Multiple Gradients
paper funnels, small brushes
Jewelry photography requires a lot of time for trial and adjustment. Gemstones are often translucent so the lighting is critical to capture the many shades and the way the human eye will perceive it when worn. Manipulating the backlighting is key coupled with light modifiers to direct the light.
No flash was used. The difficulty in photographing jewelry is the highly reflective surfaces. With more stones and beveled cuts the number of reflections multiply. We used one softbox for continuous lighting, scrims to create gradients and foam core for bounce. Shooting an entire product line with few “like-products” requires a new setup for each piece.
Shot using a Canon f2.8 100mm Macro lens and a Canon 5D Mark 3 camera.
This lifestyle portrait session began with a rather grey room, but after a bit of dressing up, drive in a vehicle and add lighting-bingo; the stage was set. Props add to a portrait-mining maps, or in the case of our next geologist a smile and a pick hammer! These guys were a lot of fun. It’s always a pleasure to work with people who love their work.
We brought in 3 Arri Lights, 1-750 watt and 2-650 watt for stunning atmosphere.
Everything was shot on a tripod using a Canon 24-70mm mark 2 lens and Canon 5D Mark 3. The staff photos turned out wonderfully!
Some products are just gorgeous due to their exterior surface. This diamond pattern is lovely! The reflective nature is the tough part about photographing this product. Our client is launching a new product line with two sizes of this unit. They also wanted to show the quality of craftsmanship, details and a product styled use image.
Product styling always sounds simple: Grab some items and stack them inside. The last thing you want for your product is distraction from the unit. In this case we discussed colors of soda, lid options, choice of cans, what to put on the top rack, position of the labels and making sure everything was “balanced” to the eye–and keep these items from moving/rolling. Attention to detail pays off in a well laid out composition and the product “shines”. In this case–it always shines!
Reflective products (glass, metal, jewelry, high gloss acrylic products) offer challenges. Once the lighting is in place-then you begin to block out reflections you don’t want – inclusive of the photographer in the product. Controlling the light to not blow out the high reflection, yet show off that very shiny surface we all love. The diamond metal pattern here controlled some of the typical hot spots. We were also able to make use of massive overhead natural lighting and several white reflectors to obtain an even product surface look. Working all of the elements together takes a lot of time. We spend more time setting up a shot, than shooting, typically. Shooting multiple angles meant repositioning everything (continuous lighting, white reflectors, c-stands, every clothes pin and re-taping) with each change of angle, and the second unit.
When you’re selling online any product photography should include an all-the-parts shot, manuals included. Let prospective clients know what’s in the box. We’ve also been asked to edit the photos adding the dimensions for clients. Make it easy for people to buy your product!
Continuous Lighting
Natural Lighting
White Reflectors
Canon 24-70mm 2.8 Lens
Canon 100mm 2.8 Macro Lens
You have a great product and you’ve got your product on white shots, but you need that one great shot-often referred to as a “hero” shot for your Amazon product page. Even with minimal equipment you can maximize your composition to stage your product.
This rustic cabin decor lamp with painted shade and metal art; and small wood carvings against a tongue and groove wood wall serves as the canvas to creating more dramatic photography. This is your stage and these are the basic elements to arrange as you look for the shot you’re after. This isn’t about being quick-it takes time and a lot of shots. Beyond arranging what you see through the lens you’ll change up the shutter speed and focal length for a wide range of variables to find that end shot.
Turns out less is more.
Adding a floral stem to the very foreground adds shadow and depth. The focus is clearly on the cabin lamp with the floral having the bokeh. This is using a very slow shutter speed and wide open aperture (2.8).
Here the focus is reversed-bringing the floral into focus maintaining the same slow shutter speed and aperture. This might work for a backdrop image for marketing text while you still display your product.
The experimenting continues, same lens settings, but rearranging the floral, playing with the light. This, too, can be a nice backdrop drawing the eye to the foreground where you might add your marketing message for a website slider.
Then often you come full circle to include parts of several variations of your composition. This used the same settings, pulled in the wood carvings and feathered the floral to a wider angle for a beautifully balanced and bokehed rustic cabin decor photograph. This gives a lovely staging while highlighting the lamp and giving a vision of how it will look and feeling it creates once brought into the buyer’s home.
Canon Lens EF70-200mm f/2.8L USM
Slow Exposure 0.3 seconds
Rotolight to spot
We shot a full line of industrial lighting products at the manufacturing plant. From overhead lighting you see in commercial retail stores and manufacturing plants to stylized industrial quality hanging pendant lights and solid metal exterior parking lot lights this was an extensive catalog. Some of the lighting products measured nearly 9 feet in length.
Shooting against a backdrop we used existing light which was a mix of tungsten and fluorescent light. We used a 5′ x 5′ scrim to soften the overhead skylight. By trial and error we shot with automatic exposure, viewed each product for accuracy and adjusted as needed to match our eye. Once we began photo editing we had a great reference which gave us a perfect color match. This was the most efficient way to shoot the products within an 8 hour day. Crucial to time management in a product shoot like this is having an employee of the client on hand to move product.
