E-commerce Fashion Website Assignment

[jimntonic]

Hi All,

I am new to this website and looking for assistance with a particular project. My photography has been a hobby at best however people are now asking me to shoot for them. I haven't had much experience working in this industry and i wanted to challenge myself to a particular project before i go any further.

A friend is starting a clothing label and has asked to replicate a particular style of photo for the website products (dresses) I was wondering if anyone could assist me with the following questions:

- Lighting the subject
- Crop & Margins for consistency with each photo
- Would you use a tripod for consistency or shoot freehand?
- Touch ups recommended post processing e.g smoothing of the skin, particular settings to focus on

Any other recommendations you have to recreate a similar shot to the image provided would be greatly appreciated. As i mentioned earlier i'm new to this an open to any suggestions this community has.

Please do not post images to which you do not hold rights. You may post links.

 

[KmH]

How to Obtain Permission
http://www.copyright.gov/circs/m10.pdf

 

[tirediron]

This is very straight-forward work, but it does require some equipment for best results. Ideally, 5 lights (Inexpensive Yongnuo or equivalent speedlights will be fine if you're not shooting a lot; if you are, studio lights might worth the investment), light stands, umbrella brackets, triggers and white, shoot-through umbrellas. You will also need a roll of white seamless background paper and appropriate mannequins.

I would definitely shoot this from a tripod; in fact once you get the set-up down pat, I would diagram it all with measurements, angles and light outputs so you can recreate it any time. Get a clothing steamer and LOTS of small clips & clothes pins to take care of wrinkles and "tailor" the clothing to mannequin.

Set-up for this is fairly simple: Two lights at 45 degrees to light the background; the product 4-6' in front of the background and usually 2 lights on it as well. You may need a third for larger items. All you need to know about this can be found in the lighting bible. Buy and read this first.

 

[ashleykaryl]

Good advice above. Colour accuracy is important to clothes sellers, so shoot a custom white balance once your lighting is set up and ideally use custom camera calibration.

You need to ensure your exposures are consistent and correct across all your images. I would set everything to manual and use a light meter. That will also allow you to meter various areas of the scene to check for consistency.

Make sure you use a good lens hood and protect the lens surface from stray light by shielding it from the flash light. The last thing you want is a bunch of images ruined by flare.

This is really just an exercise in good basic technique and obviously making sure that the clothes look good.

 

[jimntonic]

Thanks for all the information everyone, believe it or not it's extremely hard to find a particular tutorial demonstrating the above requirements. My apologies for posting the image i was unaware of the rules. I will post some of the results once the shoot is done!

The camera and lens combo ill be using is:

- Canon 600D
- Canon L f/4 16-35mm