The Lighting Handbook

Now that you've set up your photography studio, figured out a naming convention and have decided on your camera of choice, let's talk about light -- and how to use it to get the best possible product images. In nature photography, the primary light is the sun, and the fill light is the equivalent of the open sky, which softens contrast. We go outside and the sun is lighting us from above, when we're indoors the lights are lighting us from above. In fact, not too long ago a corporate head of one of the worlds leading camera manufacturers released a head-shot with horrendous under-lighting so it's not just enthusiasts that fall foul to this one.

If you have placed the product too close to the background, you may get some shadowing; if this happens, you can do one of two things: (1) simply move the subject farther away from the backdrop to achieve a clean, white background instead, or (2) select the product in post and place it onto a purely white backdrop of your own making.

Sets of purpose-built studio lights can be acquired for $100-$500 with everything you need to set up. These studio lighting kits commonly use large florescent lights and include effective diffusion material. Floor lamps can be useful for filling shadows or backlighting, but are not usually powerful enough to use as your main light.

Best of all, in her demo she uses a light source we all have easy access to at least some of the time: the daylight right from your window. This ensures that you have just enough soft lighting to directly brighten your subject for a more three-dimensional look.

For fast shutter speeds to avoid blur caused by subject or camera movement, you need a lot of light. PROS: Constant light output is easy to preview and meter; often inexpensive; easy to use; usable with any camera shooting mode (program AE, for example). We are going to put the led lights in the middle of the PVC pipe and the bowl, creating a perfect circle, and connect them with the batteries to have a source of energy.

Generally they come in sizes iamrmitsharma of 12″, 14 and 18″ in which you can put your camera in the centre of the circle of light which is typically held by the included lighting stand. There are so many creative ways to use artificial light, such as table lamps, flashlights, candles, car headlights, street lights, or even iPads and iPhones.

In these situations we need to illuminate our subjects with artificial light sources. Again this is a mistake that is quite subtle and sometimes tricky to avoid but it's always worth being aware of it. A basic rule of lighting for me is that you always want to create ‘clean lighting'.

In this course, photographer and educator Abba Shapiro details the why and how behind using LED panels and other continuous lighting sources for photography. Flash can be used as fill light to bring out the details, colours and textures of your subject, especially in the shadows.

In this article, I am going to highlight 5 key things that I see portrait photographers doing that I consider to be in need of improvement.” And although there are no hard-and-fast rules to photography, try to think of it as being similar to an instrument being slightly out of tune or a meal that's perhaps a little too salty.

Although they are most frequently used for fashion and beauty videos, ring lights are a great option whenever you need to make sure that the subjects of the video are perfectly lit. LEDs keep talent and photographers more comfortable throughout the shooting process.