If you're taking your first steps in a business and have decided to bring your offers to the web, it's essential that they look great in front of the camera. In other words, you need to know how to take product photos, what the most important details are during that process, and what kind of equipment you should have at your disposal. A good camera, the right environment, plenty of light, and a little patience will make a huge difference.
Forget about casual photos taken with mobile phones: if you want to sell something, it has to appeal to the eyes for real. The shape of the product, its colors, the chosen background, the angles—everything matters. And what about imperfections? Is it better to leave them intact, or is it worth making a few edits with software? Many photographers prefer to minimize their time in image editors, but if used in moderation, the final result will be very positive. Personally, I believe that the question of how to take product photos is never fully answered, and that's not a bad thing. It's a work in progress, and there's always something new to absorb.
How to Take Product Photos
Product photography presents us with a huge challenge because we're dealing with very subjective aspects like attraction and desire. Let's use the example of a computer: if the seller simply takes a photo of the inside with a phone and all we see is a jungle of cables, that tells us their attention to detail isn't a priority and sends a negative message. But if the computer is clean, has decent cable organization, and was photographed with good light on a neutral background, the offer reaches us more clearly, and we receive more information through the images, gaining our attention in the process. This throws us headfirst into the first recommendation…
Prepare the Product
Modern high-resolution photography is a true marvel, but at the same time it has no mercy when it comes to dirt. While a speck of dust or a white cat hair on a piece of black plastic can be removed with simple editing, the idea is to minimize the chances of that happening. In other words, prepare the product before starting the session. A basic cleaning will take you a long way and helps reveal additional details. What does that mean? Imagine you have to photograph an object made of bronze or copper. Many collectors adore the patina on the metal and want to see it up close. Our goal as product photographers is to give them that pleasure, unless the object is very rare and requires professional restoration. In that case, it's best to minimize our contact to a minimum. Study each situation.
Of Course, You Need a Camera…
It's a complicated decision, but not impossible. This guide on how to take product photos is generally aimed at beginners, and the camera you choose should follow a similar direction. Fortunately, we've done the homework in recent weeks, with articles dedicated to two very interesting units. First, we have the Nikon D5600, the latest representative of the D5000 series that adds everything Nikon has achieved so far in the entry division. Our second option is the Canon EOS 750D, with very similar price and features, not to mention an impressive range of accessories. Both cameras work at 24.2 megapixels, have flip-out screens, and include support for remote shooting via smartphone.
Get a Tripod
Stability and comfort are two critical elements. If you have to bend like a pretzel or turn blue holding your breath to capture a product placed on a table, something isn't quite right. Obviously, there's always the possibility of improvising, but the value of a tripod in product photography isn't easy to ignore. The market offers many models with a good balance between price and features, and one of our favorites is the Gloxy GX-T6662A Plus. However, if your budget is a bit larger and you'd like to gain portability for outdoor product photography, you can't go wrong with the Manfrotto BeFree, which measures just 40 centimeters in transport mode.
For Heaven's Sake, Light!
Although it may seem strange, a convincing proof of the importance of light is on YouTube. Many YouTubers often share the behind-the-scenes of their workspaces, and if there's one aspect they care for with a certain level of paranoia, it's lighting. Lights, diffusers, boxes, special backgrounds… it's a true arsenal. We've repeated it to the point of exhaustion, and we'll say it again: Without light, there's no photo. The most impressive product can become generic and unattractive if it doesn't receive enough light. Its abundance also allows us to work with lower ISO values, avoiding the appearance of classic grain.
The most effective way to resolve any light deficiency is to acquire all the necessary components in a kit, and if there isn't one, today we came across two. The first is the VL-400 Plus Softbox Extra, with two flashes, two softbox windows to soften light, an umbrella, two stands, and a conical adapter with honeycomb grid and auxiliary filters. The second is the Visico 5 Professional kit, which replaces one of the windows with a beauty dish, raises the flash power to 400 watts, and adds a trigger for automatic flash control. These kits are available under the SKU "KitVL400Extra,KitVisico5Plus".
The Magic of Light Boxes
Relatively inexpensive, very useful… formidable. Light boxes (or softboxes) not only provide a balanced and uniform working environment, but also allow us to take advantage of a very valuable external element like natural light. There's a wide availability of models that, in addition to being very convenient for photographing products with compact or extreme dimensions, turn (almost) any space in our home into a photographic studio. Another very positive feature of light boxes is their portability. They're lightweight, easy to assemble and disassemble, and don't need much in the way of support. The big question you need to solve is size, and here are a couple of suggestions. Let's start with small objects:
Vfoto Photo Studio (40 cm)
By far, one of the best options for starting in product photography without putting a hole in your budget. This photo studio includes a cube-shaped light box with 40 centimeters per side, interchangeable backgrounds in four different colors (white, black, red, and blue), two basic lighting fixtures, and a small camera stand (it's a good idea to check compatibility beforehand). Both the final number of elements and the size of the light box guarantee its portability, and all of this can arrive at your hands for just 80 euros.
Walimex Light Box (75 cm)
40 centimeters are more than enough for a good number of products, but it's not hard to find things that require a slightly larger light box. If you're willing to reuse the lights and stand from the Photo Studio box, you can add the Walimex box to your arsenal, with 75 centimeters per side. The box comes with a blue background, but includes three alternative cloths in white, red, and black. Its cost right now is over 50 euros.
Walimex Jumbo (200 cm)
Furniture, paintings, electronics, complete computers, even a seated person… no, 75 centimeters aren't enough. The solution is simply to increase the dimensions of the light box, and the folks at Walimex respond with their Jumbo model. Despite having 200 centimeters per side, this model is quite portable, and you should be able to assemble it in minutes. The background is reversible, so you can alternate between blue and gray.
Quadralite LH-40 Photo Kit
So, if light is essential and boxes are so useful, why not get everything in one package? You'd actually be losing a bit of flexibility in your final setup, but if you want to go down that path anyway, we can recommend without a doubt the Quadralite LH-40 kit. Its 75-centimeter light box is on par with what we've seen so far, and it comes with backgrounds in four colors (white, black, red, and blue), but the crown jewels are the four 30-watt LED lights mounted in 26-centimeter reflectors. The four stands come in small (24 to 35 centimeters) and large (60 to 220 centimeters) sizes, which allow us to cover every corner of the box without difficulty.
Choose a Lens
Whenever someone asks online about the best lenses for product photography, the most popular answer is "it depends on the product itself," and those who dare to give a number suggest something between 50 and 100 millimeters. That means the standard lenses that come with cameras serve as basic options, but you'll soon discover that you might need a slightly more specialized lens. The first one that comes to mind (but far from the last) is the Tamron SP AF 90mm fixed lens. With a minimum focusing distance of 29-30 centimeters, not a single detail of your product should escape.
Consider a Special Background
White or gray are the two 'safest' colors in product photography thanks to their neutrality, but as we've said before, photography wants us to experiment. That leads us to the realm of alternative photographic backgrounds. Industrial walls, snow effect, cities at night, nature… there's a lot to choose from, and the best part is that you can also extend their use to portraits, which optimizes your investment. These backgrounds are available under the SKU "MI15477,IM712518119,MI15478".
Pay Attention to White Balance
White balance probably deserves an article of its own, but suffice it to say that it's a very important step to get the true colors of the product. In relaxed terms, white balance can be done through the camera (either automatically or with presets) and/or with digital editing by shooting in RAW format and using gray cards. The good news is that those cards are easy to find and cost no more than 50 euros.
Make Mistakes and Experiment
Of course! Product photography isn't something you'll get right on the first try. Mistakes are frustrating, but the plan is to extract something good from each one. You have to explore different angles for your products, change perspective, make friends with manual mode on the camera and play with its parameters. Move the lights around, replace diffusers, use backgrounds of two or more colors if you see fit. In short: Shoot. Correct. Shoot again. Accumulate experience. Maybe some time from now, you'll be the one writing a guide on how to take product photos, sharing your own tricks. Good luck!
