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Flatware & Silver Photography |
Shooting Flatware
That's not very good, is it?
The highlights are glaring because the flash reflects straight back at the camera. At the same time, there are too many dark areas where the fork is reflecting just the dark room around it.
The Milk Jug Light Tent
This will work great for small items. Moving up in size and cost, some of the things you can use are a large white plastic bowl; a translucent storage container; styrofoam sheets (glued together into a cube shape); a white sheet suspended over and around a table; translucent diffusion panels (you can make these yourself from PVC tubing to form rectangular frames, with white cloth stretched over them); or even a large white tent.
My Dollar Store Light Tent
Here's a close-up of that same fork, shot in my dollar store light tent... Both the highlights and shadows are smoother and there is no significant glare.
I cheated a little there by adding a small piece of black paper inside the jug. That way, there were a few dark reflections, which help to distinguish this as a glossy finish, rather than an overall gold, satin finish.
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The high gloss of flatware can be very difficult to photograph. You want it to look shiny, but direct flash or other harsh lighting can make it look glaring and harsh. Here's a shot I took of a gold-plated fork, using just the direct flash on my camera, in fully automatic mode...
The simplest and cheapest form of light tent I know for small objects is a milk jug with the bottom cut off (you shoot through the neck or a hole cut in the side), like this...
I mostly use a large plastic bowl I bought at a dollar store. It's big enough for almost anything I photograph.
