Gretsch 5120 Product Shot
As with all shiny objects, what you see in the image is not necessarily the object being photographed but the reflection from the surface of the object. Keeping this in mind, lighting can make or break a shot like this.
Cigar Rolling Montage
This is a quick demo montage that I shot for myself as a test for a lighting technique. This was shot at night using only artificial light. I wanted a really gritty feel to go with the texture of the hands and the tobacco so I raked a single softbox from behind the subject for maximum detail.
Product Shot: Guild Nightbird
I bought this guitar new in 1988, and every few years I photograph it. It is a reference for me, a litmus test of lighting and patience, and this shot was a really tough piece of camera work. I set the guitar up on a wooden block on top of some oiled black formica for a background and [...]
Product Photography at Night
I recently had the opportunity to assist the great Parisian product photographer Peter Lippmann while he was on a shoot here in Costa Rica. Peter was contracted to take some interesting product photos of shoes, but in an entirely different way. He chose to photograph the shoes in trees lit by strobe power at night. Assisting Peter [...]
High Key Product Shooting
This is a simple, and clean product shot that I used to illustrate the price of clean water in Costa Rica. I was publishing a rather controversial local magazine, and the hot topic of the month was sewage treatment. This is a difficult concept to properly illustrate without being nasty, so I chose this approach [...]
Macro Product Photography
Photographing shiny objects is hard, and working with small sets amplifies the difficulty. When working with reflective items like this watch, what you see is not so much the object, but more what is reflected in the surfaces. This means that all of the lighting on the set must be flawless, and the surrounding area must [...]
