Product Photography

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So im attempting some Product Photography with limited lighting (single light source) and limited knowledge.

First 2 attempts are as follows.

First attempt im happy enough with as i can get the background pure white.
Ok its not pure white now.

My question is.... How to get a pure white background with a product that has a large section of white touching the background like image 2?






All attempts makes the roof pure white before the background.

knickerbocker

Photoshop

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i dont have or use Photoshop.
Dont tell me it was as simple as a fill bucket ?

I was only using picasa. guess im gonna have to start duel shopping with diff software.

Corkbah

OP ... try opening the aperture more...maybe f8 or f11 ...f13 (depth of field seems a little off - from what I can see... assuming you want the whole product sharp)

use a tripod, and natural light (if you have limited lighting)...and remote release or timer release (pressing the shutter while camera is on a tripod sometimes means the camera suffers movement from the motion of pressing of the button)

if you dont have photoshop use the free version ... gimp ...or download the trial of photoshop and use it for a month for free

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i see what you mean with aperture i now see both ends are out of focus.
battery was dead in remote for remote release. (Haven't used camera gear in a while)

hard to use natural light when i get home from work after dark.
I do have a single light 35w 5400k so i use that with Mirror and paper for reflecting.

I will have a look into Gimp. thank you.

stcstc

i would suggest the white fill done in photoshop doesnt do your product justice

go grab yourself a couple of halogeon flood lights from woodies, and a white pop up laundry basket think M&S do one

put the product inside and use the lights outside, you will get nice diffussed even light, and much much brighter. this also means you can use a much deeper depth of field to give you full sharpness

try using a light from above and behind, it will illuminate the background from behind but also give nice light to the back of product

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I have one of those pop up light tents.. Ebay specials. But due to lack of light sources at the moment its useless. lol
If using halogen flood lights will i then need to custom white balance or what kind of temperature light do they give?

stcstc

just shoot the inside of the tent as the white point

that should balance it

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a couple of flood lights would be a whole lot cheaper than a flash let alone a few of them but don't they get VERY hot ?

stcstc

yea they do get hot, but not enought to worry about as long as your careful

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Thanks stcstc,

I flood lights is the way to go for me (cheap) lol

Above and behind is the "Better" Lighting setup for this kind of photography then?

stcstc

well it takes a little experimentation, but i have done a few like that

Ben D Bus

stcstc wrote: »

a white pop up laundry basket think M&S do one

Less than €5 in Dunnes AFAIR. Also makes a perfectly good softbox. Especially when coupled with a bit of white card from the art&hobby shop.

ditpaintball

You need more light, simple as that.

When shooting anything on a white background with 1 light source, if you expose for the object only, the background will always fall to a light grey.... even if you pay extra for "super bright" or "arctic white" paper.

For white paper to appear pure white, you need to overexpose the paper by at least 1 stop... maybe even 1 1/2 stop. You can do this by having a separate light on the background. Now... you might be thinking, can I not just turn up the power on the 1 light that I have? Well no... because that will mean that the object will be over exposed.

You can fiddle with it all you want in photoshop, but it will never look as good as if you do it right. ... Light is Right


If you are not able to get another light then one option is to point your light JUST at the background. Adjust your aperture so that it is over exposed by 2 stops. ... so now your object will appear to be a bit darker. The trick no is to bring in some white card / paper / foam etc. to act as a reflector. This will bounce come of the light from the background ( now acting as a light source) back towards the object and thus illuminating a bit. With this method.... it may be possible to do some adjusting in photoshop after, but it will not give the best effect. It will generally result in an image with low contrast.
*edit... I see that stcstc already suggested that.