My First Attempt

At product photography, that is.

I have been interested with photography ever since I can remember. Such interest must have come from my exposure to a dozen or so pictures of every event in my life as I was growing up. My parents used to work at Kodak Philippines, and that explains the thousand photos at home.

Since everything can be captured in a frame, no wonder the field of photography is vast, and specializing in a certain area (for lack of the correct term) of it can ease honing one's skill. When I acquired my DSLR early last year, I told myself I'd like to focus on learning landscape and product photography. In the future, I also want to have a studio, with kids as my main subject.

But with all the stuff I have been occupied with for the past year, I haven't really gotten myself to focus on learning the craft. I'd take a few photos here and there, but that's about it.

Last night, while suffering from lack of inspiration for an article I was about to write, I busied myself with searching the net on how to build a makeshift lightbox. A lightbox is like a mini studio, often used for shooting small items.

I stumbled upon a site that showed how to build one out of a frosted-side container, desk lamps, and white paper. The setup was so easy that I just had to try it out.

Here's what my DIY lightbox looked like:

Since I am such a newbie at photography, I wasn't sure if I had the right camera settings. I just kept experimenting with my camera's aperture and ISO settings, hoping to get a good-enough shot.

After an hour or so, my camera's battery died, and my shots were not even close to decent.

Here are some shots:

 

 

  

Obviously, I am such a newbie. I couldn't eliminate the shadows for the life of me. Well, I didn't have a third light set up, so I guess the shadows will always be there. All shots are raw, except for the last three (whose brightness I had to tweak a bit). Sorry, I don't know much about Photoshop either. (pathetic, huh?)

So for my first attempt at product photography, with a makeshift lightbox and a clueless newbie-photographer head, my verdict on my work is FAIL! That said, I have so much to learn. That, or I may as well just throw my DSLR in a box and sell it on eBay.

Seriously though, I hope I get to find time to really study photography. I noticed writing and photography go hand in hand. A good photo makes for a potential story. A good story can be made better if backed up by descriptive photos.