Photographing Your Own Work

Jewelry Discussion
1

Thanks so much to all the people who wrote in with explanations of
their photography set ups. Special Thanks Jesse for the tip to look
at Abrasha’s website. It’s one thing to try and understand
everyone’s written descriptions but to actually see the setup is
invaluable!! I know what I have been doing is rather crude but I
have been pleasantly surprised by the results - of course, I would
like to improve them to be able to compete with the big boys. I am
going to experiment with constructing a box. I dont’ have a digital
camera and would like to see what kind of results I can achieve with
my Nikon and macro lense. Do you think with a similar setup I would
be able to get decent results without using a digital camera??? Any
other specific would be great. For those who use this
type of setup, I am assuming you enclose all sides and the back with
translucent material and the picture in Abrasha’s website shows
photographing looking down at the piece situated at the edge of the
box. I can see this allows you to setup and manipulate the piece
easily. Have you also tried suspending pieces and shooting that
way?? I find this all very perplexing because my focus is on making
jewelry and I am not really interested in becoming a photographer too

  • I just want a setup that works that I use solely for the purpose
    of photographing my work and nothing else. So – all these tips are
    so greatly appreciated and I am thrilled that people are willing to
    share their experiences (trial and error included) to help
    people like me experience less trial and error!!!
2

Hi all

One additional tip about shooting your own work (digitally or
conventionally) that I don’t think has been mentioned–

I use graded backgrounds that I produced on my computer using my
various low-end photo-editing programs (Hotshots was particularly
good for interesting textures) and print on hi-res paper. Subtle
textures, oval, circle or freeform “spotlights” can make images more
striking. I even have one that looks like ripples in water, seen from
an angle so that the effect is oval, and creates an illusion of
depth. These are huge files, being mostly black but with texture, and
they yellow after a while because of the hot lights, but they add a
lot to my images, I think.

Good luck, all!
Noel

3

There is an article at artsights.com - artsights Resources and Information. that describes a
method of producing a blended background for photographing your
jewelry.

George