A bit of advice please.
Discussion
Hi there folks,
I'm an absolute novice when it comes to cameras etc, but could ideally do to use one at work.
I deal with glass and crystal decanters and bowls etc and would like to do the photography myself.
I've no real camera so would be starting from scratch, I don't want to spend the earth, but need the photos to look good.
Any suggestions?
I'm an absolute novice when it comes to cameras etc, but could ideally do to use one at work.
I deal with glass and crystal decanters and bowls etc and would like to do the photography myself.
I've no real camera so would be starting from scratch, I don't want to spend the earth, but need the photos to look good.
Any suggestions?
Buying semi-professional camera equipment is a slippery slope 
It really depends what 'not spending a fortune' means
£300-400 ? You could probably get a 2nd hand dslr body / macro lens. Or maybe a 'bridge' camera would perform better for you. Really depends on what sort of quality / size of image you are wanting.
(less of the size these days, the consumer digital cameras have similar mega pixel ratings to some semi-pro kit. But as they say, there is more to a camera than its MP rating )
Part of the battle with photographing glass is that it has the annoying habit of reflecting / refracting everything around it
There are a bunch of small scale portable studio setups for product shots, but if you want to keep the budget down then you may want to try a diy job -
http://www.diyphotography.net/homestudio/super-sim...
I've not tried it, but then i've not tried to do much product photography
Hope this helps
It really depends what 'not spending a fortune' means
£300-400 ? You could probably get a 2nd hand dslr body / macro lens. Or maybe a 'bridge' camera would perform better for you. Really depends on what sort of quality / size of image you are wanting. (less of the size these days, the consumer digital cameras have similar mega pixel ratings to some semi-pro kit. But as they say, there is more to a camera than its MP rating
)Part of the battle with photographing glass is that it has the annoying habit of reflecting / refracting everything around it
There are a bunch of small scale portable studio setups for product shots, but if you want to keep the budget down then you may want to try a diy job -
http://www.diyphotography.net/homestudio/super-sim...
I've not tried it, but then i've not tried to do much product photography
Hope this helps
flat-planedCrank said:
Cool link, thanks for posting it. I think I'm going to make one of those and try a few shots. Phil Dicky said:
Looking for both really, for our brochure and web site.
This is where you might run into a problem - you can get away with a lot when the pics are only for web use, but a proper glossy brochure will be more demanding.Are your competitors doing their own pics? If they are then fine, otherwise yours might stand out as being home-made.
Also, when doing the sums don't forget to include your time - if it takes you a day to produce a shot that a pro could do in half an hour then you might not be saving much after all.
S. Gonzales Esq. said:
Phil Dicky said:
Looking for both really, for our brochure and web site.
This is where you might run into a problem - you can get away with a lot when the pics are only for web use, but a proper glossy brochure will be more demanding.Are your competitors doing their own pics? If they are then fine, otherwise yours might stand out as being home-made.
Also, when doing the sums don't forget to include your time - if it takes you a day to produce a shot that a pro could do in half an hour then you might not be saving much after all.
the standard of the 'apple shot' in the above link is the standard I'm looking for.....Am I expecting too much
Another useful link:
http://www.tabletopstudio.com/documents/glass_phot...
As for the camera you need, if only used for this specific purpose a bridge +tripod may serve you well and save quite a bit of cash over a DSLR+lenses. I'd say with a tripod and sufficient light, you won't need good hi-ISO performance so you can look for a strong performer at ISO 100-200 and there are plenty of examples of those... You probably will end up using daylight or fixed lights outside of your light tent so you won't need a decent flash as well.
Just my 2p.
Maarten
http://www.tabletopstudio.com/documents/glass_phot...
As for the camera you need, if only used for this specific purpose a bridge +tripod may serve you well and save quite a bit of cash over a DSLR+lenses. I'd say with a tripod and sufficient light, you won't need good hi-ISO performance so you can look for a strong performer at ISO 100-200 and there are plenty of examples of those... You probably will end up using daylight or fixed lights outside of your light tent so you won't need a decent flash as well.
Just my 2p.
Maarten
Phil Dicky said:
the standard of the 'apple shot' in the above link is the standard I'm looking for.....Am I expecting too much
That apple shot still has some nasty reflections in it - If you added a white sheet to the open top/side of the box, and shot with that over the camera, you'd lose a lot (but not all ) of the reflections.Should be quite easy to achieve. Good luck!
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