Basic, basic lighting

[cmedin]

I absolutely suck at lighting, so here's a very basic question. I want to be able to do some decent shots of various (non-camera) items for auctioning off, have zero lighting equipment available, and just want to put together something cheap, temporary and simple to knock out some semi-attractive images of said items. Any suggestions on how to accomplish this?

 

[dumbdumb]

may i suggest available window light, reflector and tracing paper to soften the light when it needs to? works wonder and great dof

 

[rogue_designer]

how are you shooting the auction items? digital? film?

If you have something where you can adjust the white balance (or filter appropriately). Even a desk lamp with a sheet of tracing velum to act as a diffuser can be effective for small objects.

Use a tripod.

 

[cmedin]

I'll be using digital, so white balance isn't an issue. So a desk lamp and tracing paper and a reflector of some sort would suffice?

 

[pesphoto]

I'll be using digital, so white balance isn't an issue. So a desk lamp and tracing paper and a reflector of some sort would suffice?

Yes, that sounds good. Also get yourself a couple of decent size white cards....posterboard works well. You can use these to reflect with into anything that is reflective so it will look like chrome and not black or dark grey. Try and avoid to many heavy shadows so you show off the product well. Sometimes bouncing th elight off a wall of low ceiling makes a nice soft even light.

 

[MartinP]

A sort of bodge-up white-field lighting setup can be made from a brightly lit window (or other light source) shining on to a white sheet draped over a clothes drying-rack. Those racks are the things that are made of wire and which open out in to a winged-trestle sort of shape.

You can slide a piece of card etc. on to the flat area in the middle of the rack, to form the stage, and produce very diffuse lighting for small items. It is especially effective at lighting engraved items or those with surface textures on reflective items. Totally useless for a wardrobe or something large of course . . .

 

[ywenz]

use a flash with a tilt head, just bounce the flash off of a white ceiling or off of a white wall corner and you'll have perfectly smooth lighting on your product.

ceiling bounce:

wall corner bounce:

 

[mike goldberg]

Hi all
There's some good Tips here. I also bounce light off walls and ceiling, tho the tracing vellum to soften lamps, is new. The Leica shots above look like dSLR to me, yes? Cheers...

 

[cmedin]

Unfortunately the digicam is a small P&S and I do not have any other flash equipment that would work. I'll try out the tracing paper/reflector concept and see how it looks. Thanks all.