How to Take Product Photos at Home With Your Smartphone
Most ecommerce store owners know the basics on how to take product photos with a smartphone.
Grab yourself a white background, a window with a good source of natural light, choose the highest quality setting and resolution possible on your phone and….
click click click!
You now have a set of product photos for your eCommerce store.
Not exactly.
Although that’s a really positive start to shooting product photos for your eCommerce store, there are a few extra tools and accessories you can use that can really enhance your photos and most importantly demonstrate the value of your product to help online shoppers decide to have it in their lives.
Now i wont go into detail on what phones are best to use because phones are expensive which most people can’t afford to just go buy and if you were to, some digital cameras are the same price and also because the camera quality on most phones are so good i don’t need to get into it further.
So If you want to become a wizard photographer with your smartphone that creates absolute magic and take amazing product photos, here’s how to set yourself up for success.
And a hint, it all has to do with lighting.
Pick a Room With Good Natural Lighting
First step on how to take product photos at home with your smartphone is to find a room with a well-lit window that provides flattering natural light.
If possible, find a room with a large window space. This is because the bigger the window, the more natural light you’ll have for bringing your product to life.
When taking your product photos move your workstation as close to the window as possible.
By taking product photos closer to the window it creates a much softer light with darker shadows.
Being farther away from the light source will give you lighter, sharper shadows.
Setup Your Backdrop
Second up on how to take product photos at home with your smartphone is to setup your backdrop.
Ideally you want to work with a white backdrop for your eCommerce store.
So, place your white backdrop behind your product using a stand. You can use a portable clothes hanger or amazon have great cheap options or HYPOP have dedicated product photo stands.
This will help to give your photographs a clean and consistent look which is pleasing for your audience and it will eliminate distractions.
For much cheaper options, you could use a white paper/ cardboard, or buy poster board from your local Officeworks or art shop.
Just make sure you have a table to place your backdrop on.
You can use masking tape to hold your backdrop down or blue-tac and you can do the same to stick your product to the backdrop.
Another thing, always keep your backdrop white. This is because a white backdrop reflects natural light onto the product nicely and gives you an evenly lit photo. It also makes the editing process easier if you ever need to remove the background from your photo. A off-white color will make editing and lighting more difficult.
Get A Tripod
Tripods can range from very cheap, to cheap, to kind of expensive to really pricey.
But no matter your budget, a tripod is a good investment with high payoff when it comes to eCommerce photography.
A tripod will reduce camera shake and help standardise your camera during shooting which will result in a clean and sharp end photo.
If you want a cheap but effective tripod check out amazons range here
Use White Bounce Boards
My next tip on how to take product photos at home with your smartphone is to use white bounce boards.
Here’s why.
When it comes to product photography controlling the lighting is key when learning how to take product photos with an iPhone or Android.
Bounce boards help minimise strong shadows across your product created by the angle of the lighting hitting it and creates a more balanced lighting environment to bring out the finest details of your product.
You can buy a white bounce board made of foam from Officeworks.
Setup a Lighting Diffuser
My last tip on how to take product photos at home with your smartphone
Lighting isnt a thing that works in your favour most of the time, especially in Australia our sun, it’s very harsh and strong.
So when the lighting is too harsh, lighting diffuser sheets can be used to soften the light. You can find diffuser sheets on Amazon
If that’s not an option you can DIY one at home with parchment paper, a frosted shower curtain, or printer paper.
In The End
As you have just read there’s more to how to take product photos at home with your smartphone than just setting up your product and taking the photo.
Controlling your lighting is crucial and so important to bringing out the best parts of your products for your eCommerce store, to help tell the story you want to tell to your visitors and to entice them to buy your products.
I hope you enjoyed this article, i hope you got something out of it and i hope it helps you have the confidence to shoot your own product and eCommerce product photos within the comfort of your own home.
Any questions leave a comment and if you would like to read more on eCommerce photography tips click here
