Simple Camera and Lighting Combination Needed

<p>My sister runs a small business that uses product images on its website. She's been using a cheap compact camera but wants to upgrade. The issue is that she has neither the money for a sophisticated setup nor the time to learn lighting technique. She asked me for advice on what equipment to buy, but I'm not expert on this, thus this post.<br>

My current thoughts are to suggest she get a Nikon D7000 with kit 18mm-55mm kit lens, a Nikon SB-500-AF Speedlight (and stand), and an 8x12" softbox modifier for the Speedlight. My thoughts are that D7000 is relatively cheap, being a generation or so old but with flash Commander feature that will operate the Speedlight in TTL without the need to fire the camera's flash (which could alter the exposure in undesirable ways); and the single light with softbox will be easy to operate and experiment with.<br>

If anyone has a better suggestion, though, I'd welcome the advice. The upgrade needed is from a point-and-shoot, so professional quality is not expected. And the images will be used only (or primarily) on a website. But of course, if better quality can be achieved easily and at low cost that would be welcome. Thanks in advance.</p>

<p>You don't say what the products are--lighting for clothing is quite different from what you would use for jewelry, for example. The camera and lens you mention should do the job, but you might want different lighting depending on what she is photographing.</p>

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<p>You don't say what the products are--lighting for clothing is quite different from what you would use for jewelry, for example. The camera and lens you mention should do the job, but you might want different lighting depending on what she is photographing.</p>

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<p>Good point; thanks. The products are chocolate and candy.</p>

<p>I think you have given her good advice. It is simple, straightforward, cost effective and gets the job done. It also allows her to expand if she wants do do so later. Probably what I would have reccomended.<br /><br />Rick H.</p>

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<p>I think you have given her good advice. It is simple, straightforward, cost effective and gets the job done. It also allows her to expand if she wants do do so later. Probably what I would have reccomended.</p>

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Thanks, Rick.</p>

<p>"The products are chocolate and candy."<br /><br />For objects that small I would get a light tent. Put them inside that, probably want a flash on each side for even lighting. And I would skip the kit lens and get a macro lens so you can focus close enough to fill the frame with them.<br /><br />"professional quality is not expected"<br /><br />Yes, actually it is. If she's using pictures on her website to sell her product, the quality of the photos can have a huge bearing on how many sales she gets. Food photography is an art unto itself. Food companies spend millions (collectively) on photography that makes food look appealing.<br /><br />That said, a light tent, couple of small flash units and a macro lens can get photos that are at least technically competent. How large a product range does she have and how much does it change? She might want to consider taking the money she would spend on photo equipment and hiring a professional food photographer to shoot her products. If the products don't change every day, it could be a one-time or maybe once a year investment. It should be part of her marketing budget.</p>

<p>Thanks, Craig. Her company does hire professionals for many shots, but she has the need from time to time to supplement quickly between sessions with a pro and can't afford to hire a professional in every instance. What she wants to do now is fill the gaps better than she's been doing so far. As for a light tent and a macro lens, this would be right if the product were always small, a single piece of chocolate, e.g. But she often needs to photograph a larger display, say boxes of candy side-by-side, some laying flat others standing up. That said, I appreciate your comment and I'll discuss the tent option with her.</p>

<p>"she often needs to photograph a larger display, say boxes of candy side-by-side, some laying flat others standing up"<br /><br />In that case, the setup you're talking about would probably be a good start. You might or might not end up needing a second light depending on how the results look but starting with one would be fine. If it's a display, particularly of boxes, the nuances of food photography are probably less critical than an individual piece of chocolate. </p>

<p>Very likely she'll find herself at some point wanting a macro lens. But before she picks up anything more specialized, it wouldn't hurt to do some quick but immersive reading on food photography. The thing about food - especially indulgent items like chocolates - is that the photos need to be intimate, and nearly obsessive about the textures and details. There's a reason that you'll see the foodie bloggers refer to such material as "food porn." Well styled and lit product photography doesn't have to involve lots of lightning equipment and light modifiers ... but in the long term, that's what separates the normal eBay/Etsy stuff from proper foodie magazine quality images.<br /><br />People with disposable income looking to buy unnecessary items (like chocolates ... though some would debate whether chocolate could ever be considered frivolous!) need to be seduced. The way that light grazes and tones something succulent to eat: that's make or break in a competitive online economy. So good to start with a workhorse camera (you've selected one), a decent enough general purpose lens (yup), a good off-camera flash (good!) and a simple modifier. She'll also want to play with pieces of white/black foam core and other materials to help add/subtract fill, etc. <br /><br />Also: if you're using the pop-up on the D7000 to command and off-camera Nikon flash, get the cheap SG-3IR, which places an IR-pass filter in front of the pop-up. The pop-up will still be emitting light during the exposure, even if it's just to control the remote - and that means you may see it reflecting in the shot, even though you have it theoretically contributing nothing to the exposure.</p>

<p>TTL is tricky for this. Chocolate is dark (often) so you will get over exposed shots if you fill the frame with it.</p>

<p>I think a regular table, large enough for the largest she wants to shoot and some preset strobes or perhaps some cold lights (LED) would be better.</p>

<p>Camera could be cheap whatever as long as it has a manual mode and a hot shoe it would be fine. Any old dSLR would be fine and any of the mirrorless cameras probably even better (more depth of field). Have it preset and ready to go on a tripod. All she would have to do is put the thing she wants to shoot on the table, turn on the lights and take a picture. Done.</p>

<p>The key would be to have everything always set up, preset and ready to go. </p>

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<p>Also: if you're using the pop-up on the D7000 to command and off-camera Nikon flash, get the cheap SG-3IR, which places an IR-pass filter in front of the pop-up.</p>

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<p>That concerns me. Why would that be necessary? My purpose in focusing on the Nikon D7000, rather than a newer entry-level model, is that the D7000 has built-in Speedlight Commander, which would make firing an optical flash from the camera unnecessary. Do I have this wrong?</p>

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<p>TTL is tricky for this.</p>

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<p>Point taken, but it shouldn't be too hard, I hope, manually to adjust exposure, or flash intensity, starting with the TTL reading.</p>

<p>Anything only 8" x 12" has no right to call itself a softbox - it's just a small diffuser and will be next to useless for soft lighting at anything over 2ft from the subject. A white shoot-through umbrella would be better, or better yet, a proper softbox of 2ft x 3ft or thereabouts.</p>

<p>Although the product is small, food generally responds well to soft lighting - the softer the better. Food is often lit from behind and above to give a "shine" to it, and you need a light source that's big enough to cover the whole of the product. I can't see a tiny 6"x8" diffuser being capable of that, nor very useful generally. A light tent is also a good idea, but can look a bit bland.</p>

<p>Also the SB-500 is pathetically underpowered to do any "serious" lighting. A YN568EX or Godox V860 can be bought for less, and are around twice as powerful and just as compatible with Nikon's CLS system.</p>

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<p>>>TTL is tricky for this.<br /> Point taken, but it shouldn't be too hard, I hope, manually to adjust exposure, or flash intensity, starting with the TTL reading.</p>

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<p>Not too hard for a photographer, but for someone who just wants to get the job done without having the time to learn it's another matter.</p>

<p>First of all she has to realize that it's overexposing and how is she going to do that? From the back of the LCD?<br /> It not like she is going to fine tune the exposure by shooting raw and develop them in LR? I assume this is straight jpeg shooting.</p>

<p>So then she has to do exposure compensation or flash exposure compensation. And she has to remember to set it back when she frames differently. And of course she don't want to go to far so she has to check for blinking highlights. But when she is shooting something white and want it to look white and not light gray she has to expose hot enough but not blow it out.</p>

<p>The SB500 has no LCD so you have to adjust flash in the camera. And how is the camera going to be setup? If we are using flash we don't want ambient light to mess up exposure or color temperature. So is she going to shoot manual mode on the camera and ttl on the flash and what if she forgets to reset the camera or pushes some button somewhere and now the pictures all turn out wrong.</p>

<p>Nah, these are a lot of problems waiting to happen. And what if she wants to use the camera for something else? She'll never get it back to what it was.</p>

<p>I think it's better to buy a dedicated camera for this. And two cheap strobes or something. Everything in manual, set up to produce the right exposure each and every time. All settings that can possibly be gaffataped should be. Shoot through umbrellas like Joe said are dirt cheap. You just gotta make it dead nuts simple for her. A D7000 with a SB500 is not dead nuts simple. Not that cheap either.</p>

<p>Put the money in the light and use whatever camera to take the shot. Good lighting will show up on the web but anything with 2 megapixels or more will look great under controlled lighting.</p>

 

<p>Why has no one mentioned Strobist.com, and in particular the "<a href="http://strobist.blogspot.com/2006/07/how-to-diy-10-macro-photo-studio.html">DIY $10 Macro Photo Studio</a>"? This small light box, or a commercial version of it, is almost the perfect place for your sister to start. It would probably be too small for anything larger than one or two pieces of candy, but it is flexible enough that she could figure out what she needed (one light? two? White, reflective surface on the far side? Black?) and then spend the real money scaling it up enough for the larger subjects -- once she has a little experience.</p>

<p>She wouldn't even need a flash to start with, assuming the camera is on a tripod. One of those utility lights with an aluminum reflector and a black-market 100 watt bulb would work fine for the small subjects. As long as the camera had a largish sensor, manual control, and a hot shoe (for synching that off-camera strobe that she may want later), your sister wouldn't need to buy more than a camera and a tripod to start with. I expect that she already has the kitchen table and maybe even a table lamp (to save the price of a utility lamp).</p>

<p>If she wants to go all-in, she should start reading "Lighting 101" on the Strobist site and buy the simple lighting kit suggested there. That would include the umbrella that someone suggested up-thread. But myself, I would wait; that box makes small things really easy.</p>

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<p>That concerns me. Why would that be necessary? My purpose in focusing on the Nikon D7000, rather than a newer entry-level model, is that the D7000 has built-in Speedlight Commander, which would make firing an optical flash from the camera unnecessary. Do I have this wrong?</p>

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<p>That camera can indeed intelligently control remote Nikon iTTL speedlights - it's a great feature! But it does so by emitting control pulses from the on-camera pop-up flash. The SG-3IR helps to block the <em>visible</em> light emitted during that process. The amount of visible light is very small, but at least some of it still occurs during the time the shutter is open - and if you're shooting something that will provide specular reflections, that little signaling pulse from the pop-up might still show up. Hence the little filter. I use one, happily, with multiple Nikon bodies when doing just the sort of thing you're talking about, when I'm not using the bigger, fancier studio flash hardware.</p>

<p>Hot lights of any sort and chocolate? Not a good combo.</p>

<p>Also you don't need any commercial gizmo to kill the pop-up flash reflection. Just get a bit of aluminium "tinfoil" and make a sideways or upwards reflector for the popup. That way you can direct the control flash more effectively toward the slave, and at the same time shield it directly from the subject. Old takeaway food containers are my source (or sauce) of suitable reflector material.</p>

<p>Thanks to all. And Pete S. has convinced me to go cheaper and without teaching my sister TTL. Just an entry level DSLR and a kit lens (plus maybe a macro), a slave strobe with power adjustment (or two), and an umbrella (and maybe a small-product tent). We can work on manual settings and placement of the strobes, record them, then have her go on auto-pilot from there. Again, much appreciated.</p>

<p>For such a task manual power flash is the way to go. After you get it right most of the time it's the same settings.</p>