Product Photos: Kit to get sterted?

[OldChap]

I wonder if anyone here can help or link me to good but cheap equipment guides etc for photographing Products of items like cases or smaller.

I have a 5D, cheap short tele lens and tripod so far, a few filters too, but now need to expand my horizons.

From a cost point of view I am thinking of permanently lighting rather than flash but I am open to anyone's thoughts on what is the best way to proceed

[Darakian]

Depends on the product. If it's small stuff you can probably get away with a nice white cardboard box and some good lights. If it's bigger, like say a car, you're gonna need more :p

[OldChap]

Computer case and smaller.

I had in mind something like this....

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/3-x-Cotton...item19e9fa815b

[Darakian]

That should work very well. I don't do any product photography myself but it's all about lighting. Either creating or removing shadows. I saw a really good video on it one time where the guy did a full production thing with some flash lights. I'll post it here if I can find it again. You might want a white backdrop instead of a green one though. :p

[[XC] Oj101]

You can go cheaper if you want, I started off with an A1 sheet of paper taped low down on a wall and curving down onto the gound, I'll try to explain with a Paint illustration:



I know it's rubbish, but it's laaaaate...

For soft lighting, I did something similar to this http://photography.tutsplus.com/tuto...20--photo-2966 but used tracing paper as a diffuser and instead of a flash I used an LED torch. The light box cost me probably $1.50 or so to make, I used a cardboard box that I grabbed from a local supermarket and my only real expense was the tracing paper and a roll of tape (I already had a torch).

Considering I was on film and didn't have the ability to edit the background into solid white, I think it worked pretty well. If I was on digital and could edit the background, it would've been even more impressive.

Photography can be as cheap or expensive as you want. On one extreme, you can go DIY; on the other you can pay hundreds of dollars for a shooting table and thousands on continuous lighting. My definition of a pro photographer is not just how they handle the business side of things, but also being able to push the limits using any equipment.

[NKrader]

talk to bundymania.