This might sound shallow, but looks matter. At least when it comes to an eCommerce business that is! 2 things that immediately steal a visitor or user’s attention is the overall look of the website design and product photography.
Imagine selling products that look poorly displayed, making them look like a secondhand item or far from attractive. That’s why having high- quality and beautiful product photography is the battle any eCommerce business must win in order to gain profit and credibility.
When an eCommerce beginners can definitely use a DIY product photography table for a great quality result.
There is one common technique that is usually applied, especially for beginners in product photography. It’s called The Window Light Technique. Let’s begin this tutorial and pretty soon, anyone who intends to have a DIY photoshoot will benefit from the awesome end results.
Preparing Your Gears
Camera
To begin with, you’ll need a good camera for DIY product photography table such as DSLRs or any good one not less than 5 years of usage. You may even use your smartphone and can still expect good product photography. Whatever tool that is handy to you is just the small part of the overall DIY photoshoot.
Tripod
For awesome product photography, it’s a good idea to use slower shutter speed to allow more light through. When a camera has a slow shutter, it’s likely to produce blurs – this is when a tripod will come in extra handy. Any good stable tripod will be a great help with your DIY photoshoot
White Backdrop
Look for pure white mat board or white sweep as your photoshoot background. This will allow a lot of options during shooting and editing.
White Bounce Cards
A piece of foam board that will be use to bounce light back onto the product.
Additional Tools
Such as a small table to place your product and a tape to stick down your board. It is also best if you do your DIY photoshoot in a room that has adequate lighting such as one with windows and sunlight exposure.
Read also: Improving Product Photography for e-Commerce Business
DIY Photoshoot for Product Photography
Step 1: Table Setting
Design your shooting area to be as close as possible to the window without having shadow falls your area or product. The closer you are to the window, the softer the light will be. Avoid direct sunlight because it is harsh and looks bad on most products.
So basically, adjust your table so that you have secondary light exposure instead of strong sunlight. Turn off all lights inside the room to avoid other light that might disrupt the lighting. If you don’t have any window source, bring in additional lighting that you have.
Step 2 : Backdrop Setting
Secure your white backdrop from being flat on your table to being vertical. It may be necessary to roll up the board to help it reach that shape.
Then place your product in the center on the flat part of your white backdrop while allowing some space to put in your bouncer later.
Step 3 : Camera Setting
If you can adjust some settings, these are the key essentials :
– Auto White Balance
– Flash off
– Image quality : finest or largest.
Another important feature is the exposure setting , you can either set it to Manual (M) so that you can change your f/stop to the highest number for the greatest depth. Otherwise, you may pick Auto Exposure, this will allow you to add or lessen the correct exposure.
If you use smartphone, click on the area you want to exposed properly.
Lastly, play with your Zoom In button. Avoid using digital zoom on camera so your quality stays, especially if you have optical zoom so that you can aim for longer zoom.
Step 4. Product Setting
It is best to keep it simple and place your product in the middle of your overall setting. You may need to play with position, but the important thing is to keep centered.
Step 5. Bounce Card Setting
Try different angles that will allow the best light bounce to fill in the shadows.
That’s it! You’re ready to take some pictures for previews. This is where a lot of trial and error comes to play. Experience also helps you to know what is working and what is not, so it is highly suggested that you explore different angles and experiment with what you have.
If you have your laptop or computer nearby, it’s a good idea to plug your results right up and see up close what you’d like for your product photography. If you don’t have an exact result of your liking, fret not because that’s where photo retouching or editing will come in very handy.
Post production which is the image editing part allows more digital magic to happen to create the result of beautiful image photography for eCommerce. So if you’re just learning to get a good grasp of product photography, it’s always a good idea to spare some room for image editing work as well. Or, Dropicts as a professional photo retouching services can surely handle the enhancement of your DIY photoshoot for the best result of your DIY product photography.
Those are some tips for DIY product photography table. Happy doing the DIY photoshoot and we hope this simple tutorial works in your favor.
