Which Lights for Still Life Product Shots

[ianbarber]

I have recently started importing items from China for my website but as they are not supplied with High res images, I will need to be thinking of taking my own.

How much working space do I need?
The products are quite small, ( Photography Accessories)
The current room I have to work in is approx 9 foot square

What type of lights / modifiers do you suggest?
At the moment, I have 2 SB-900, a 38cm x 38cm Lastolite Ezybox softbox and a 38cm shoot through brolly.

What type of backdrop?
Ideally I would like to have the option of creating the pure white background as well as a pure blackground for some of the products. The only backdrop I have at the moment is a Lastolite 6 x 7 hilite which I thought about laying flat on the floor.

 

[Garry Edwards]

Your space will probably do - just.
You need studio flash for this, others will always disagree and say that hotshoe flash are fine but they're not, you need the fine control that only studio flash can provide. This kit is ideal, the softbox can be used for overhead fill (you'll need a boom arm for that) and ideally you should have a product shooting table as well - which also makes a backdrop redundant. You'll also need a honeycomb, I suggest this one.

Lencarta also has a small boom arm that will do the job (no price yet, shouldn't be long though) and a couple of product shooting tables, which aren't on the website yet.

 

[ianbarber]

Thanks Gary for the reply.

Will this lighting kit also serve for other uses like portraits or am I better off with a bigger kit that will allow more oppurtunities should they arise. Any reccomendations on shooting tables?

 

[Garry Edwards]

Yes, that kit's ideal for portraits too.
As I said, Lencarta has two new shooting tables in stock, they're brand new and although I've physically got one of each sitting in my studio I haven't had time to assemble, test and photograph them yet so I don't have any info on them. I'm doing a shoot tomorrow but hopefully may be able to get to them on Friday.

There's a useful review on a cheap shooting table here which may help you, the Lencarta ones will be bigger and more expensive.

Shooting tables (and photographing small products) are extensively covered in my still life photography tutorial