Saturday, August 24, 2013

Why Tailor Made Professional Photography is Worth the Expense?

Flexibility of digital pictures has prompted everyone to indulge in heavy equipment. Since only few make the grade, only custom made artworks are proving to be valuable.

In such a scenario is tailor made professional photography worth the expense for commercial or individual purposes? The fact that today a person taking photographs can manipulate the pixels and create designs is the driving force of the job. Professional photography is the answer why those pictures for online shopping carts look so stunning. If you are planning to launch your own online store, bypassing the digital image-taking world...is professional hara-kiri! All customized photos are costly but not just without a cause. The amount of hard work and technical equipment employed justify the pocket burning price tags.

The digital revolution has empowered the professionals to bring out masterpieces. The stunning quality of the product shots is often the result of image taking with awareness and post production technical support. New technologies are brought in to supplement the traditional challenges. While keeping a strong foot in originality of the art, professionals are resorting to latest techniques. They are able to fully control various factors during image taking process. The rest is taken care during the image editing according to the demands of the industry. With so much elasticity comes a cost.

Good quality digital camera equipment and accessories are heavy-duty investment. It is no secret that setting up a well-equipped studio with proper lighting arrangement, props and other technical support is costly. Professionals can be hired on hour basis or for a day or more. Good product shot need hours of experimentation and often several shots have to taken and edited before choosing the perfect one. A photographer may spend hours before he gets a hint of the client’s idea of perfection and the way he wants to portray his stuff online. A potential online buyer is likely to get hooked to the product’s attractive picture. It is different story for every product. The customized photos break new grounds each time so that there is no boredom even when the catalog is added with hundreds of pictures at a time.

The high cost associated with professional photography is associated with expensive equipment, their maintenance, the creative efforts, the studio setting, post production work and amount of valuable time and effort spent on each shot. More it if often teamwork, a photographer needs assistance of art directors and professionals who would help getting the right props and their arrangement. Along with all these factors there are several other constant expenses for running a professional photography business. Unless it is hobby or a part time engagement, one has to earn the cost of maintain the cameras, get good quality lenses and improve on the technical assistance on a regular basis. A single good quality lens may cost $900 to $2500. So now you know the bigger portion of hefty bill goes into the making and maintenance of a system which in inevitable for good quality product shots.

On parting note, isn't it worthy of spending on professional images considering the kind of fortune they bring for all online business? And they are worth the expense in the bargain.

Sunday, August 4, 2013

Jewellery Photography Needs a Vision of Perfection

The important keys to wholesome jewellery photography are keenness, lighting and sparkle. And of course with perfection vision the mission can be accomplished well!




Reputable jewellery photography needs sharp and concise focus to achieve the finest effects. Accurate high-resolution cameras like Nikon and Cannon Digital Rebel with 100 mm macro lens will look at a wide area of jewellery that needs to be photographed and position it accurately. This is known as "spot focus" mode that allows precisely what the camera will be focusing on.  Sometimes many digital cameras cannot capture the small shiny gemstones.  For close-up, a camera with good manual focus ability is needed.


Soft Lighting effects work best for jewellery photography.  When a series of lighting is used the final image can be visualized. On-camera flash does not always lead to good photos. Occasionally the camera’s flash will be too bright at a close distance when taking pictures and will not light up the jewellery properly. They may also create harsh and distracting shadows, which are harmful when showing to the customers.


Fluorescent bulbs that are well compressed provide pleasant, natural-colour light and produce very little heat serving as an advantage during long photo sessions. A light white satin tent as a diffuser is used that makes it easy to reduce glares and control shadows for jewellery photography.  He will decide on what lights he wants when he is shooting jewellery items like gems, sapphires, rubies and how to add sparkle to diamonds.  The bulbs can be ‘daylight’ or ‘sepia toned’.


LED bulbs are considered as a diamond sparkler producing sharp quality images of the jewels. Camera must preferably be kept on spot mode where the close up photos of diamond, emerald or intricate stones are targeted.  While the photographer is shooting, the lens or the hand movement can get unsteady at times.  A tripod is absolutely essential to use as support enabling sharp images to be clicked effortlessly.


A professional photographer has to portray every precious diamond’s unique sparkle intricately in its metalwork.  Each piece of jewellery is patterned differently concerning its design, shape, finish and its opacity. The use of controlled lights will give brilliance to a particular piece of jewellery.  Implicit focus to capture the detail is very important.  Eventually the professional’s skill to regulate the components ensures that the mission is accomplished with patience.


The age of computers has enormously helped jewellery photography.  Many clients can browse online, choose and decide which jewellery they would like to adorn and purchase the same.  The shutterbug is also an expert at color balancing, converting white gold to yellow gold, changing the color of gemstones and can provide extensive retouching to make sure the products appear in their best light.  The photograph of the product will display the finesse; sparkle and design when different lights source bulb colors are blended during the shoot.  Preferably use 5000K daylight-balanced bulbs to produce a proper image.  Be sure that the entire lights match in color as the exact exposure brings out the best results.