New to Prod Photography

This is actually my second post here, but it certainly won't be the last. I work for a virtual skincare and cosmetic store BuyBeauty, and I just recently started doing some of the product photography as well as managing the shown inventory online. Well, my boss bought me a (in my opinion) cheap setup for a lightbox and lights. He got it on eBay, and it's just not really up to standard.

My problem is that I can't often get the background washed out enough to be usable without editing it in photoshop, which is what I was trying to avoid when I asked him to buy a lightbox. I've tried everything. I've tried playing with the exposure, shutter speed, everything. The background looks white near the bottom but gets grey as you go up. Any ideas???

 

more lights and put one directly on the background

 

put your product on a piece of white plexiglass with a light under it. You can get a nice glow from beneath that way

 

Well, I'm restricted on materials and space. I will see if I can try the plexiglass idea, but as for the light on the background, do you mean from behind the lightbox? Because it's part of this "easy carrying case" so the back part of the box is solid black.

 

no im saying have about two lights on your product, and then have a light in the front faced at the back of the box and then use your on camera flash or a speedlight if you have one

 

Oh okay. What sort of light would you recommend? Because it's a fairly small box (I think maybe 16x16x16 with products that are half as tall or taller) and I don't want any harsh light hitting the product directly.

 

Well i mean if you aim two lights like i have at it and use the on camera flash you should be fine without any harsh shadows.. i just bought three clamp lights from home depot they were like $4 a piece and i built my box myself. but i did get these eco bulbs they're those compact fluorescents and it was the 100w equivalent daylight but make sure you get the daylight one or they have a yellow cast to them.

And for the harsh light hitting the product thats what the light box is for you just shine light in there and it disperses it. so yeah its not too hard

 

Heres just a sample shot that i took when i was setting it up and this is with no photoshop

 

It's actually quite simple as long as you have the right tools and a few bucks to go to home depot.

It could be done with any lights as long as their a 1:2 ratio for power, and you have something that can act as a softbox (think bedsheets)

I shot this wrench,



Like this:


Yes, my handwriting is terrible, but legible.

notice the softbox, and the two strobes lighting the white seamless on the background. also notice how the seamless is being lit using strobes that are twice as bright as the softbox.

2400Ws vs 4800Ws. I also used a 5D with the 90mmT/S because the softbox was in the way and I couldn't get exactly straight above the subject.

I couldn't illustrate the black cards because they would have gotten in the way of the other drawings, but there are black cards on all sides of the wrench for separation.

 

I don't have much money to do anything too extravagant. In fact, I'm quite broke right now and my boss won't spring for anything fancy or expensive. If he would have, I would have made him buy me something good to begin with.

 

Also, did you edit the image of that wrench in any way? At all?

 

nope, thats straight from the camera. just resized and posted it.

you don't need strobes to do this, you just need a light, something to diffuse it, and 2 others that are twice as bright each. glass is cheap and you can improvise the rest.

just set the WB, and use a tripod.