Product Shot Help

[wgp1987]

I have been taking photos for quite sometime now and understand the importance of lighting. I have taken photos while the subject was standing in front of a backdrop being lit by umbrellas and softboxes. My friend has a clothing brand and we have taken photos with his product with what lighting and space we had.

So jump ahead 6 months later after different setups of lighting trying to achieve better results Im fed up with being ghetto haha. Im interested in purchasing lighting of 1-3 lamps. Not sure which type of lighting id like to use. I was hoping someone had a tip for lighting clothes to get proper detail and color.

I was thinking about using a collapsible 5x7 chroma key blue/green backdrop with 2-3 softboxes whether incandescent or fluorescent not sure which is better. I have worked with both. Enjoy the florescent bulbs because they dont get hot but the warmer tone of the incandescent is enjoyable as well.

How do you feel about
EDIT: BTW if you know a good retailer for lighting such as BH or someone who has a sale on a kit like these here.

Steve Kaeser Photographic and Video Lighting - i like this one becuase i can use it for portraits as well

Steve Kaeser Photographic and Video Lighting

Any help is greatly appreciated.

[TPF Sponsor]

[Helen B]

I use incandescent for all product photography that doesn't need strobe to freeze motion or balance with the light coming from the product (eg an LED flashlight). Incandescent light and strobe do not have the troublesome spikes in their emission spectrum, so it is easier to get a good color match. You can use a camera profiling system for color accuracy if you wish. Which one you use depends on which Raw processor you use.

We use a pure white background if we want to isolate the product (Savage #66 - it's very close to a true neutral white, better than Super White) then Topaz ReMask if necessary, preserving the shadows.

What is your total budget for lighting, stands etc?

Best,
Helen

[wgp1987]

Which model do u use and where did u buy it at?

[Big Mike]

If you are shooting the clothes with people wearing them, then I'd suggest going with strobes rather than any type of constant lighting (incandescent, florescent etc.)

[Dao]

Isnt' that using florescent light cause banding on the photos because of the light flickering (60Hz/50Hz)

[O|||||||O]

Isnt' that using florescent light cause banding on the photos because of the light flickering (60Hz/50Hz)

I think that would depend on the shutter speed. As long as it was long enough to capture a complete cycle, I don't think it would be much of an issue.

[wgp1987]

Sorry for not replying sooner. I have a budget at around $300. I currently have a nissin di622 flash and would love to own a canon 580exii but cant afford it. I figured since im a novice with working with flash and strobes that continuous lighting would be ideal for multi purpose use. I was unaware of banding from fluorescent bulbs but that is a good point. I currently work for a company that uses a 600watt incandescent softbox to shoot video and when i take pictures the subject always looks great. I have taken photos in fluorescent as well and loved it. I was debating on buying two fluorescent softboxes but now I looked into that banding issue. Helen mentioned using incandescent lights for her images and i would really like to see a sample. Right now we are shotting just the product with no model. Eventually we will work with models. What do yo think?

[wgp1987]

BTW i saw this online ... they recommend fluorescent but it seems to be an add for the lights

Clothing photography - how to take pictures of clothing

[wgp1987]

Apparently a shutter speed over 1/100 creates banding with fluorescent

[Helen B]

If all your sources match in terms of colour temperature and tint, and the image is properly white balanced in post, the type of light won't affect the final image much - not as much as choices made during post. We mix shots taken with incandescent and shots taken with strobe all the time.

Banding shouldn't be an issue with most fluorescents and focal plane shutters. Most of them use high frequency ballasts nowadays - they don't flicker at mains frequency but at a much higher frequency (eg 20 kHz). The thing about fluorescents is that they have spikes in their output spectrum that are not easy to balance out to get totally accurate colour.

Our main light is a 4 ft x 4 ft softbox with four old Speedotron strobe heads and four separate modeling lights which are household incandescents at about 2700 K. I use the modeling lights most of the time. First two taken with incandescent, third with strobe.

Best,
Helen

[wgp1987]

nice shots.

in the description of the bulbs it says "flicker free" ... so does that mean banding is unlikely regardless of shutter speed?

Steve Kaeser Photographic and Video Lighting

[wgp1987]

i like this as well ... these have fans in them, would that lower the heat in the room or only for the bulb?

Steve Kaeser Photographic and Video Lighting