Product shots - looking flat and dull

[bramley]

Tried some macro shots of jewellery my sister's made. Placed the pieces on white card in front of a window, and used off camera flash for extra light. I was getting exposures of 15-30" at f/22, with exposure comp up quite a bit (to prevent the white background from underexposing).

The problem is the shots just look dull and flat. Why is this and what can I do to make them have a bit more sparkle and look more interesting? Fiddling with contrast on the raw files has helped but still the shots are a bit lifeless. Have tried all the different WB settings.

Presumably it's just a lighting thing, but without proper lights are there any steps I can take to improve things?

Any suggestions welcome.

[S. Gonzales Esq.]

Where's that ' This Thread is Useless Without Pics' smiley?

[bramley]

LOL - that did occur to me! I'll post some up later, I left them at home.

[Gemm]

As requested.....

[cirks]

bramley said:

what can I do to make them have a bit more sparkle and look more interesting?

Change the battery Sorry, couldn't resist after reading your other thread

When we see the pics, you might get a more sensible answer from me!

[bramley]

Right here goes, excuse the sensor dirt, anyone would think I opened up my camera and held a pepper grinder over it.

Straight from camera:


Tweaked: levels, curves and sharpening:


Straight from camera (eugh!):


Tweaked: levels, curves and sharpening:


Probably should have cropped the last one but anyway, you get the gist. Obviously they are better after some tweaking, but still lacking something. In my defence these were fired off quickly as a test, so little thought for composition.

Any comments etc welcome as ever. I'd really like to help my sister out and take a load of shots for her, but I don't feel happy giving her shots like this as I don't feel the quality is there.

I reckon a piece of white acrylic would be a better surface than a piece of white card. I suppose my question is can i get them looking better without lights? If so, how!

All done with 5D, 100mm macro lens, off camera flash. ISO 100 approx 15" exposure (very little natural light where I was).

Thanks

[_dobbo_]

Out of interest - why use a 15 second exposure? Can't you just whack the flash in the hotshoe, and use bounce flash?

Doubt the 15 seconds is contributing to the problem but it seems an unusual approach to me.

[bramley]

I find the problem with the macro lens is the tiny DoF, so i was using f/22 and at ISO 100 that gave me a 15 second shutter. Flash was just on auto with a stofen and two small pieces of card to reflect a bit of light back on it from the top left hand side. In hindsight, f/22 was perhaps overkill, and a narrower DoF may have drawn the eye more to one point of the image.

[crmcatee]

I think they'ld look better on a black background.

[drivin_me_nuts]

1. Get a lightbox. 30ish quid for a foldable one something like the ones this chap sells

http://www.stevesphotoshop.co.uk/light_tent_cube_3... (they really do make a difference - though iron them first

2. get some decent reflective surfaces inside the light tent

3. Light it from the outside - but be smart simple low voltage lights from Ikea (or similar) work very very well - just fix them at different hights to tables etc

http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/catalog/products/3001856... I use 6-10 of these and they produce lovely light

Handle pieces only with photography gloves and give a damned good clean every time with a good quality glass cleaner to add that sparkle.

(and don't pi** around in photoshop with it - unless you are an ace at it, it looks as fake as a Gordon Browns 'personality'

Edited by drivin_me_nuts on Monday 19th November 22:07

[bramley]

Quite possibly! My sis had requested white background but I'll ask again.

[VxDuncan]

Whats the main aim? to show the product in all it's detail or making it look fantastic as the expense of clarity? Your lighting setup seems to go for the former, which is fine, but they maybe won't make them look their best. Personally I'd take a shallower angle onto the product (get lower), dim the frontal lighting significantly, then add a key light from behind. Ideally you want angle the light hits the large flat surfaces to be the mirror of the angle it reflects off that surface into the camera lens. Think of looking into the sunset over water, and the light sparkling off the water, shallow angle, it bounces of and into the lens, as opposed to looking out to sea with the sun behind you.

I'd go for three lights (or reflectors, flash, sunlight etc. one dim, 45 deg to the right, one dim 45 deg to the left (maybe slightly higher and/or coloured) then key light from behind matching angle of incidence to angle of reflection.

[bramley]

Some helpful stuff there, thanks.

My sis had some 'proper' shots done in a studio but she can't afford to have all her work shot there. Some of the galleries she submitted the pics to didn't think the shots were that great. Reason being the shallow DoF didn't show much of the pieces themselves. I need to compromise somewhere in between.

[Simpo Two]

Something like this?

[bramley]

If I got a shot even close to the quality of those I'd be over the moon! Great work!

You offered me some lights a while back and I declined - don't tell me those were taken with them!!!