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As a small business owner you have to wear many hats and turn your hand to a number of trades to get the most out of what you are doing. I would say that my worst area of expertise would be product photography, and yet it is one of the most important things when trying to sell your items.
I thought I would give you all a few little pointers that would give you an idea of what I do and use to attempt to get better pictures of my items.
Backing boards
I cheat in this department there is absolutely no need to spend a lot of money in this area. I use samples of wallpaper that I get from a local DIY store. Personally I prefer the wood plank effect but you can literally pick anything that you think will showcase your items. Paler colours and subtle colours seem to be the trend at the time of writing this but you don’t have to follow the trend!
Some people choose to paste the wallpaper onto large canvases or poster board to give a more crisp finish. This is on my list of things to do however at the moment I just clip them up with bulldog clips.
Photo tent
I have a pop up photo tent, I had to get a fairly large one as I had to fit my cushions in to take photos of although you can get a smaller one if you do smaller items like jewellery. I find that the photo tent cuts down on shadows falling across your items and gives a nicer finish. The one that I have came with a number of backdrops in a few different colours. I however found that these were horribly creased and all the ironing in the world wouldn’t make a difference. When positioning the photo tent I found that the best results were when placed side on to a sunny window. If you are lacking in sunshine lights can be added to help light up the tent.
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This essentially can be the basic set up which will enable you to get started, there are a few other items that I added over time but they are not essential.
SLR Digital Camera
I use a proper camera for my photos as opposed to my phone camera, this is purely because I haven’t found my phones to have very good cameras on them. If I had the time I would learn all about the camera and how to change all the settings on it in order to take the perfect pictures however at the moment I just use the automatic settings and find this works for me.
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Tripod
I am awful for taking shaky pictures so I found that the best solution for me was to use a tripod with the camera. This ensured that my pictures weren’t blurry and I found the pictures to be more uniform, as the camera didn’t move and I could alter the products and props easily in between shots.
Props
One of my favourite prop photos is this picture of my wedding clay tags, the light and the angle I feel really makes the picture. When selecting props try and pick something that relates to the item without distracting from it. I find that flowers work quite well for a number of my items. The flowers are artificial so I can use them over and over again without having to source more.
Watermarking
Watermarking your pictures is a possibility although a number of online selling platforms do not allow you to watermark your product pictures including Facebook and Etsy. Therefore there maybe isn’t very much need to watermark them if they are the selling platforms that you use. For the pictures that I do watermark I use Photoshop which I find gives you the widest range of editing options for your watermark. Although basic free software like uMark can provide you with the basics necessary for pictures.
Pictures are so import as for many customers it is the only way they can view your items prior to purchase. Bearing this in mind you need to ensure that you cover any questions that the customer may have about the items using photographs. Therefore you need to take pictures from a number of angles and try to demonstrate the sizing of your item. I usually try and put a common sized item in the picture to help demonstrate the sizing so either a coin or a ruler as these are readily available to compare sizing to.
