Questions for Photography Gurus

After seeing many great photos taken by our fellow CPF members, it inspired me to try to take better product photos. I have pretty bad lighting at home, so I've searched around to find some photo lighting and lightboxes. I came across this: http://www.cyberguys.com/templates/SearchDetail.asp?productID=13214

and wanted to see what you guys think in terms of price and whether I should consider purchasing this. What's your recommendation?

you could probable easiely create your own with some big art paper and some thin white plastic bags.

Although, what you are really paying for is the two mini flash thingies. Those look kind of cool.

But really, all you need to take a good photo is a tripod. To get nice colour rendition, just use a standard incandescent house lamp, and change your exposure till you get the effect you like.

Crenshaw

I'm hardly a pro, but I built something similar using PVC and white nylon (purchased from a local fabric store). For lighting, I use 3 clip-on work lights with standard incandescent bulbs. I had the PVC and the lamps/bulbs, if you had to buy all of it it would probably be about $50-$60 or so.

That said, I think it looks like a decent deal. Especially as you don't have to spend the time cutting/measuring/etc. I'd be curious to see how quickly you can break down this set-up as that's the only major draw back with mine (it takes up a fair amount of space even when not in use).

I believe the two lights are lamps and not flash heads, which is better for product photography (in my opinion at least, again...not a pro).

As Crenshaw noted, a tripod is pretty crucial. If you don't have a good tripod, I'd invest in that long before I went for a light box.

Edit - I see this comes with a "camera stand". I'd still get a dedicated tripod first.

I am a mere hobbyist, but use the EZcube 20"x20"x20" for my light box needs. You will also want to consider the TableTop Studio Two Light Set for lighting. Just placed an order (as in minutes ago) for an X-Rite i1Display 2 colorimeter to improve screen color accuracy for digital image processing . I recommend the Manfrotto 475B tripod. Well built and sturdy.

oh yeah, im no pro, very far from it, i dont even have my own DSLR....

its something i really need to get one of. Everyday walking around, i see tonnes of shots in my head, but never get to take them....

Crenshaw

As a few people have said before me the first thing that you need is a good tripod. This is a must to get clean, crisp shots. You will need less light if you take longer exposures while your camera is on a tripod. If you don't feel like spending a lot of money this is a good tabletop tripod that supports quite a bit of weight. It easily supports my large digital SLR and flash. I like to use flashlights for interesting directional lighting and usually a 40 watt incandescent desk lamp for fill light. I usually like to use interestingly textured items to display my items. If you want a white background, the white and grey foam board that you can buy at Walmart works great for white backdrops.

Here is an example being lit with flashlights,
scroll to the bottom of the thread.
https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/197699

The SLIK MINI-PRO is another alternative. Here is my TruePulse 200 mounted on a MINI-PRO .

I thought about making something myself, but when I saw the photo studio in a box for $90, I figure it would be easier and possibly cheaper for me to just buy it instead.

Crenshaw said:

you could probable easiely create your own with some big art paper and some thin white plastic bags.

Although, what you are really paying for is the two mini flash thingies. Those look kind of cool.

But really, all you need to take a good photo is a tripod. To get nice colour rendition, just use a standard incandescent house lamp, and change your exposure till you get the effect you like.

Crenshaw

Click to expand...

Thank you guys for the responses so far. I only have a Casio Exilim digital camera at the moment, so I'm not sure if I could set the exposures (I normally use auto ), I guess I have to read the manual that I've been procrastinating to read for so long

Adam, thanks for the link to tabletopstudio store. Did you buy any of the lights yourself? If so, how do you like it? Seeing the price of tabletopstudio, it makes me question how the link I posted is so cheap. :shrug:

xcel730 said:

Thank you guys for the responses so far. I only have a Casio Exilim digital camera at the moment,

Click to expand...

omg, is that the first gen one that was realllllly thin, 2.0 megapixals? i have one of them, lol!theres no manual setting in that one.

alot of photos i posted here are from my friends nikon D40x though.Some are from my cousin's EOS

Crenshaw

lol ... it's a little newer than that. It's actually a 7.2 MP, got it for about 2 years already. It's a pretty nice camera. They take all the thinking away from you by allowing you to select the "best shot". I want to learn how to do it without using the best shot feature.

xcel730 said:

Did you buy any of the lights yourself? If so, how do you like it?

Click to expand...

I have the dual light setup as linked. I am a builder by profession. One of the tenants of good lighting design is high CRI. Outside of candlepower/sqft calcs and requisite fixture placement, bulb choice dictates how faithful objects appear as they would in natural daylit conditions. Based on our visual tests against a number of next generation, high CRI LED bulbs from Philips, the trumpet bulbs fare very well and are recommended. I proceeded with the purchase because like you, I figured it would be easier for me to just buy the entire system.

I have a lot of photo gear, mostly obsolete film stuff but for digital I use two hardware store clamp lamps, compact florescent lights and grocery store plastic bags for diffusion of the light.

Like this photo.

I have seen the set you linked to or one similar at Wal Mart in the discount section in some stores. I don't know if they are still out there or not. I think it was slashed to $30 but I didn't have any room in my bags and I was out on the road or I would have bought it.

I saw Lumiere L60199 Umbrella Portable Photo Studio from COMPUSA. It's even cheaper at $39.99.

For light, what color temperature should I go for? I've seen 2800K to 5000K.

Instead of buying a set, I may end up just purchasing the tripod, lights, and diffuser seperatedly. That way I could get better gear that'll last me for a long time.

xcel730 said:

For light, what color temperature should I go for? I've seen 2800K to 5000K.

Click to expand...

5000K is generally better in that the spectrum is more balanced. It's also closer to a standard in that most digicams have a sunlight white balance setting. Remember that all light sources are not created equal. If you use typical CRI 80 5000K CFLs the results will not be as good as using the much better full-spectrum types. Incandescent will probably work OK also using the incandescent white balance setting. The main problems there are heat and lack of short wavelengths. Color correction can only do so much. If there isn't much blue light to reflect off a blue object it's going to appear darker than under a more balanced spectrum.

I'm personally intrigued at the idea of making a light box using RGBA LEDs. These would provide great color rendering, and with proper circuitry also be adjustable to different color temps.