Product Pictures

[Picto]

Just wondering what everyone else does for product shots?

We're getting to the stage now where this is causing headaches. Suppliers pictures are often rubbish or just plain non existent so we need to take our own.

We have a great camera but a very basic set up at the moment, with cheap lamps and a screen. Pictures require quite a lot of treatment afterwards which is very time consuming. It's clothing and accessories we sell by the way.

Any have any knowledge of studio photography or know of any forums I can have a nose around? We just need to know what equipment we need

 

[Esk247]

do 360 rotations like in alot of the big websites e.g. Next

it's easier to re-create than you think.

depends on your budget! if you want to keep it in house then just get plain white backgrounds for the photo's and use the tripod to keep all the images in the centre of the photo!

 

[David P]

We went through the exact same problem as you although we sell a slightly different product.
In the end we went for in house despite its relative slowness because...
We can be dynamic i.e. when new products come in we are not relying on getting a pro in which is costly and could cause delays. This was the big plus and if your stock is not really changing then i reckon going pro is better.
You can also get exactly the shots you want and adapt if you suddenly feel another angle or something would look better.
Our setup is not amazing but it is doing the job for sure.

 

[Picto]

We went through the exact same problem as you although we sell a slightly different product.
In the end we went for in house despite its relative slowness because...
We can be dynamic i.e. when new products come in we are not relying on getting a pro in which is costly and could cause delays. This was the big plus and if your stock is not really changing then i reckon going pro is better.
You can also get exactly the shots you want and adapt if you suddenly feel another angle or something would look better.
Our setup is not amazing but it is doing the job for sure.

That's our problem our stock has a very short shelf life, between 3 and 6 months at most. As it's seasonal casual wear we often have to get pictures of over 300 products at a time and get them online ASAP. We need a set up that requires little or no after treatment really

 

[David P]

I reckon you have to go for DIY then.
How many pics are you taking of each product and of how many products as an estimate.
Well to give you an example of what we can do is say we want a picture of one of our handbags we can take it and then the only processing after is giving it a completely white background, cropping it and then making it the right image size. This really doesn't take much time at all.
If you want me to tell you a bit more about our setup, which may or may not work for you, PM me and will try and help more. will be a slight delay as I am off out for bit

 

[Picto]

I reckon you have to go for DIY then.
How many pics are you taking of each product and of how many products as an estimate.
Well to give you an example of what we can do is say we want a picture of one of our handbags we can take it and then the only processing after is giving it a completely white background, cropping it and then making it the right image size. This really doesn't take much time at all.

That's exactly what we're doing at the moment and it's taking way too long. At times we have maybe 300 products to go online ASAP. Depends on the product but usually we need 2-3 pictures of each.

We're thinking about maybe creating some sort of funky standard background to use so we don't have to keep cropping the images. We still need some quality lighting though. Sounds like you have a similar set up to what we have at the moment, basic white background and a cheapy set of lamps?

 

[downsouth]

I'm currently looking into this myself, agree on the quality of images sent by suppliers etc, some aren't too great

What sort of price are we looking at to get a company to handle the taking of images etc?

Anyone know of a company etc?

 

[First in Retail]

Visit Prodfoto.co.uk

Product Photography is VERY difficult and expensive, we do it for a very reasonalbe price.

We shoot to white and our prices are fully inclusive.

if you visit www.cruiseclothing.co.uk EVERY image on that site was produced by us.

If you have the quantity you say then £4.50 is what you will pay for your images.

Craig
01204 708028

 

[Calibre Designs]

Why not give the project to professionals who has the know how of how to take the pictures with the setup already?

We can supply two sets of pictures - one optimised for web and a set prepared for print in high resolution.

 

[First in Retail]

300 items such as tshirts would take us 5 days. (2 images per shirt) and wold include all the resizing, perfect white back, FTP, CD, basically everything you need.

As an example we shoot between 50-100 products A WEEK for cruise ( with an average of 4 images per item) and we actually manage there website, so we update the site at the same time.

Pretty impressive when there is only 3 of us, and we have 8 clients of this nature !!!!

It has taken 2 years and (10k worth of gear) to perfect the whole shoot on white thing though its not as easy as people thing

 

[deniser]

I do the DIY thing.

For product photos, I take the photo of the clothing item in a bright spot by my patio doors on a large sheet of coloured paper. I then edit it with paint shop, crop the photo to make it square, cut out the shape to give it a white background, adjust the brightness/contrast, adjust the colour tone if necessary, adjust the sharpness if not completely sharp and use the eraser for any bits I want to tidy up.

I spent weeks messing about with these tools but have now got the hang of it and can do each picture from start to finish in about 3-5 minutes which means that I can do several per day - I do about 4 pictures per product on average. So about 12-20 products per hour with a bit extra for the additional pictures but this doesn't take long as the settings tend to be the same.

I have the same problem in that I like to load the products quickly - same or next day - so I take the photos in the morning, edit the main picture, load it onto the site, then spend the evening editing the additional pictures while watching TV then add them later.

I take photos of almost all my products as I like the site to look consistent and not a mishmash of my pictures and those of my suppliers.

However, some garments are impossible to photograph in this way and I use models and take snapshots of them on a big white paper roll on a stand. I have had so many problems with lights and lighting (mainly because I don't want to spend a fortune on professional lighting) that I wait until it is sunny and natural light conditins are good and then take the pictures and edit them to lighten the background. I haven't quite got the hang of this yet and am still perfecting it although it is not bad considering it doesn't cost anything.



Hope this helps.

 

[First in Retail]

"basic white background and a cheapy set of lamps?"

We have seen this so many times, its just not possible, you have to do some form of post production, although with the correct gear and knowledge it can be minimised a lot.

Ultimatley you live and die by your images and the information you give to customers on your site, if they are not bang on then someone elses will be.

I belive in letting the retailer get on with retailing and we manage the technical stuff

Give us bell if you need any advice, we are not sales men and will help if we can.

Craig
www.Prodfoto.co.uk
www.Firstinretail.co.uk
01204 708028

 

[David P]

Without wanting to annoy anyone on here I would still really recommend DIY in your position unless that is you are selling so much, you can afford going pro.
You just seem more suited to it seeing as how you have so many new pictures constantly being required. Might take a little while to get good (it did with us) but in the long term i Suspect it will be better.
our setup is a decent camera, couple of decent lamps with our pics being taken against a white background, then processed on photoshop.

 

[First in Retail]

I would say DIY if you can, its just not many people can, plenty try, I suppose its just down to quality, if you can get away with it then why pay for it.

However I think 4K for 900 images (300 products x 3) is a great price.

but I would wouldn't I

 

I would say DIY if you can, its just not many people can, plenty try, I suppose its just down to quality, if you can get away with it then why pay for it.

However I think 4K for 900 images (300 products x 3) is a great price.

but I would wouldn't I

Thing is you can buy very good, easy to use set ups for less than £4k and you have them for life and they can produce perfect images every time.

For me on a personal level there are issues with the photography of some of the products on cruise even and a prime example for me in the handbags, they are not showing their true colours, nor are they from all angles - as most womens sites would take them, the Zagliani bag looks stunning in professional products shots such as http://allwomenstalk.com/mauro-zagliani-metallic-python-puffy-handbag/ but yet looks significantly less appealing when I look at the ones on Cruise. This only goes to prove that the professionals dont always get it right either!

Set ups such as ones from Ortery http://www.ortery.com/index/index.php are very good and there are a variety of these light box type products for around £2k or less.

and go even cheaper still with a create your own lightbox http://sodoityourself.com/cheapest-light-tent-light-box/

and articles on how to take good product photographs http://www.theswitchboards.com/articles_professionalphotos.html

Product photography is nearly all about having the right lenses and good lighting.

These days for fashion photography I think the expectation is that sites start to take a leaf out of Asos.coms book and have many images, be able to zoom into images and the more you can see clothing on real people - even if they are models - the better, rather than lifeless shots of clothing in thin air.

 

[Kernelpower_Ltd]

just take photos in good light and always cut out the background , this is the best way for diy imho

 

[luckyg]

just take photos in good light and always cut out the background , this is the best way for diy imho

What would you describe as being good light? Sunny day with sun behind you? Genuinely curious here as I need to to soem diy shots.

 

[Esk247]

get that sunlight in there guys YEEHAR! i swear by it for my photo's....not that i have any online anymore but when i did it was always in the daytime, bright sunshine, light angled on to the product and snap away at lots of different angles and see what you get!

if your dealing with lots of images then yes go with a professional, set up a weekly afternoon of product shoots with them, e.g. £400 << example and you see them every friday afternoon get all the products done and then by monday they are ready to upload...or even by sunday or saturday if your as much of a workaholic as i am

 

[First in Retail]

boho:

Quote: "For me on a personal level there are issues with the photography of some of the products on cruise even and a prime example for me in the handbags, they are not showing their true colours, nor are they from all angles - as most womens sites would take them, the Zagliani bag looks stunning in professional products shots such as http://allwomenstalk.com/mauro-zagli...puffy-handbag/ but yet looks significantly less appealing when I look at the ones on Cruise. This only goes to prove that the professionals dont always get it right either!
"

How can you quote our colour is wrong, have you seen the bags we photographed ? they are actually spot on, we would not dream of putting a product on a site with the wrong colour, we use fully calibrated monitors, what we do is show the products as they are, thats why the retun rate is tiny, there is no point is making the product somthing it is not, it about customer expectation.

We take multiple angles of the products, I assume you clicked on the image, most bags have 3-4 shots.

Yes you can buy the stuff, does not mean you can actually take a picture, use photoshop, ect, if it was so easy everyone could do there own, the fact remains that it is not.

Asos and net a porter have loads of staff doing images (and I mean loads), spend £££££ on equipment, when clearly they should have just stood in the carpark on a sunny day with a few white sheets ?

I am not being confrontational, but the way you put it you make it sound simple, its not. I think we are talking about different levels of websites, the DIY sohts are ok for the "smaller" site, and that is no way a negative comment.

 

[Kernelpower_Ltd]

What would you describe as being good light? Sunny day with sun behind you? Genuinely curious here as I need to to soem diy shots.

bright sunlight is good , but their needs to be enough light to show off your product well , you can even use table lamps if you want , i couldnt envisage spending 1000,s on photos , also you can do some good things in photoshop just using the basic functions.

some of the photos on our site need alot of work but some of them i think are really good ie...

http://www.kernelpoweruk.com/detail...ation-therapy-edta-detox-formula-360-caps.htm

and

http://www.kernelpoweruk.com/detail.../38/dell-poweredge-146gb-hard-disk-drives.htm

I think its as much about what you do with the photos after you have taken them , just my opinion. if you have 1000£s to spend then go ahead , if you dont then you have to make the best of what you have, which is usually a £100 digital camera.

 

I wasn't trying to be confrontational either, the bags I have seen look closer colourwise in all honesty to those on the Saks website and Saks are the authorised online retailer of Zagliani in particular - hence the video with Mauro Zagliani being interviewed.

I hadn't seen there were multiple images and I wouldn't expect to have to click on one main image to see more images either, so I think thumbnails of the other images underneath the primary one is something that should be considered for that site.

The ones that struck me as particularly looking less striking than the real thing were the black one, which is a pretty shiny bag but looks duller in the online image and the gold which looked a lot less gold than the Zagliani gold ones are generally - such as the famous Kylie one but then that could be down to the shade of the gold itself.

All I was trying to point out really was that there is some very good equipment on the market and you can spend less than £4k obtaining it, in an ever moving fashion market paying £4k each time you need a load of product shots is a lot of money, and IF someone took the time and trouble to learn how to take good product photography for themselves and investing in the right equipment then they could be financially better off in the long run.

Dont get me wrong I dont think it is instantly easy, but I just dont think beyond someone to learn how to do it either.

 

Asos and net a porter have loads of staff doing images (and I mean loads), spend £££££ on equipment, when clearly they should have just stood in the carpark on a sunny day with a few white sheets ?

Own staff and own equipment then, not outsourced, in the very early days of Asos their images were a bit of a mixed bag, as the company became bigger (and worth a lot more) and they revamped the website their images became the first class ones they have today. I think most of us have suggested a DIY route because of the cost and the frequency of the images needed to be taken, as a business grows then the ideal is to do what Asos do and have their own staff and the several £ks worth of equipment to do it.. with the number of products and images they have then surely the staff+equipment still works out to be a relatively low cost in comparison to what it would cost them by now to go £4k per 900 images multipled by the number of times that required to cover the number of products they have?

 

[Esk247]

i think the fact is in this world and this forum the big factor is MONEY!

i mean it's all very well sayin you need a professional blah blah but what if you have a budget of £50 << won't get much done for that unless you do it yourself.

if you have a 10k budget then the world's your oyster.

 

[SIXS]

Just my 2p's worth....

I have found in my personal experience that having professional photo's will not only enhance your website but also make you look professional.

An example is i sell an item on my site for £129.99. The picture has been professionally taken to a high standard. The same product on a competitors website (who is higher than me on google) sells the product for £89.99. The item i sell is my best seller and not to mention the feedback i get from customers i.e the detail of the picture convinced them it was the right choice compared to others.

Therefore if you are serious about running a business, outsource the photo's to a professional and you concentrate on running your business and making money!!!

I think they call it making a commercial decsion.....You only get out what you put in.

Like i said at the start just my 2p's worth based on my own experience so dont blast me

 

Just my 2p's worth....
Like i said at the start just my 2p's worth based on my own experience so dont blast me

Lol, and most people would agree you are right, but there is a world of difference between needing one photo for one static product that is the long running thing you sell, and fast moving goods where images are required all the time, and thats where the balance comes, unfortunately the case for most people is that they cannot afford the money for the professional photos of their several thousand piece product range so do the best they can until the position changes, thats not to say gradually having any more constant products photographed by a professional wouldn't be a good idea...cos it would...but when money is an issue then the solution has to be to learn as much as you can and buy the best solution you can to tide you over until you can employ or pay someone else to do it for you

 

[First in Retail]

asos and net a porter do it in house for reasons i dont know probably because they like to manage lots of people.

I know net a porter are running over 20+ people on there visual merchandising operation, now thats a lot of people. They put on the site about 100 products a week, thats about the same number we put on cruise, and wedont use 20 people

One of the biggest issues with fashion is speed, if you go DIY 900 images is going to take a long time, my guys spend about a day a week ironing

4k is my price, the standard web charges would be double that, if you look round the average price is about £10 all the way up to £90 an image.

 

[Picto]

Lol, and most people would agree you are right, but there is a world of difference between needing one photo for one static product that is the long running thing you sell, and fast moving goods where images are required all the time, and thats where the balance comes, unfortunately the case for most people is that they cannot afford the money for the professional photos of their several thousand piece product range so do the best they can until the position changes, thats not to say gradually having any more constant products photographed by a professional wouldn't be a good idea...cos it would...but when money is an issue then the solution has to be to learn as much as you can and buy the best solution you can to tide you over until you can employ or pay someone else to do it for you

You've hit the nail on the head there. We sell t-shirts that wholesale at £8, retail for £19.99. We do sell a lot of higher value products as well but out of maybe 3,500 products about 2,000 are t-shirts. Adding £4.50 to the cost of getting them online is just simply a non starter, no matter how good the pictures are

 

[Cracking Media]

You've hit the nail on the head there. We sell t-shirts that wholesale at £8, retail for £19.99. We do sell a lot of higher value products as well but out of maybe 3,500 products about 2,000 are t-shirts. Adding £4.50 to the cost of getting them online is just simply a non starter, no matter how good the pictures are

Maybe I am misunderstanding something here, but what you say would only be true if you only sold one of each t-shirt.

 

[Picto]

Maybe I am misunderstanding something here, but what you say would only be true if you only sold one of each t-shirt.

How so? You still need to add £4.50 to the cost of each style, some of which are stocked in very low quantity. As little as one per size of S,M,L,XL. Once they're sold out they are gone

 

[First in Retail]

can we see your site?, I cant really comment, but better pictures do make better sales

 

[Picto]

can we see your site?, I cant really comment, but better pictures do make better sales

I'd prefer to stay anonymous for the minute but here's a typical product pic that's been ripped from the site-

http://img403.imageshack.us/my.php?image=exampleimagesi9.jpg

We're actually happy enough with the quality it's just the time involved in taking pictures that's the issue

 

[Cracking Media]

How so? You still need to add £4.50 to the cost of each style, some of which are stocked in very low quantity. As little as one per size of S,M,L,XL. Once they're sold out they are gone

If you are only selling low quantities of a style and the profit margin is small then yes, that would be an issue. In the scenario you have described if you were to sell one per size of S, M, L and XL, that is 4 sales so the cost is around £1.13 per sale - still too expensive I agree on a small margin, but the cost is not £4.50 per sale.

My point was that the cost of a product photograph is not added to every item that is sold but is spread across to cost of all the items stocked and sold of a particular type. If you sell 100 of a particular product then the cost per item sold at £4.50 per photograph is less than 5p added to the cost of each sale.

What is most important though is that you can also expect to sell more of something that is well presented. With the example above, if the markup on a product is more than £4.50 then you only have to sell one item more than normal to pay for the photograph.

 

[sinogan]

thank you all for fantastic information it is of great help to me