The explosion of Amazon as a marketplace has sent many sellers scrambling to meet the  “on white background” standard set for Amazon sellers. It can be frustrating because Amazon defines on-white as in RGB color 255, 255, 255.  The slightest off shade results in non-compliance.

There are two ways to achieve this pure white.  The best quality is to shoot the product on white and truly have it ON white, properly lit. Like this:

But what if your product is white?  If you try to shoot white on white (pure white) without professional setup equipment you’ll end up with little definition to your product.  There are techniques used by photographers one of which is using acrylic to give a suspended look to the product and flooding it with light resulting is a rich depth of white – on white.  Notice the sheen, the fibers of the nylon straps and the full out line of each product.  Like this:

The other method of achieving a pure white background is using Photoshop to extract the product.  If you begin with a properly well-lit product and know you will finish the work in Photoshop this can result in getting more shots taken in your session time.  It’s a discussion to have with your client.  Extraction works for products with defined lines – fuzzy slippers will be more time consuming to extract.  As a photographer you need to budget your time, or you will spend more time in Photoshop than if you had properly lit the product to begin with. Bottom line: get a the best image with your camera and you can save time OR do the most in Photoshop.