Lighting for Free

Lighting. It is the most important aspect of product photography. You could have the fanciest camera, but if your lighting is incorrect, you will not get good results. Conversely, if you have good lighting, and a so-so camera, you will get surprisingly good photos!

Photo editing can repair some lighting errors, but not all. The heavier you need to correct with software, the greater your image quality will suffer.

So lets talk about lighting! The options are countless, so I would like to focus this blog post on a readily available lighting option. If we start looking at strobes, fixtures and gadgets, we will soon realize we could easily overspend! If photography is your hobby, or your livelihood, then those things are exciting. But this blog is for those selling a product, and needing to get good pictures for the internet. We're not professionals. So, lets spend our money on other things. We can get good pictures with inexpensive lighting.

In fact, the first light source we will discuss is FREE. Yep, that's right! Can you guess? :-)


The sun. It is the perfect lighting for product photos. It is what you do with that light that will make your photos good. Placing your product in sunlight and snapping pictures will most likely not yield good results. The light needs to be INDIRECT, filtered in some way. You want to avoid shadow. Covering pieces of cardboard with silver foil (of the kitchen variety) and positioning them at angles to your product will act as reflectors and help light your product from many angles.

Do you have a counter or tabletop that gets good indirect light? Do some experimenting. Start with a white background (Typing paper, poster board, or for larger items, paper on a roll.) Position yourself so you are not casting a shadow. Position your reflectors. No flash. Macro.

A gradient background is helpful for objects that won't be well featured on a white background. It also has a professional look. You can get gradient paper at photo shops. In a future blog post I will talk more about backgrounds.

Another option using sunlight is to add artificial lighting. Doing so will cut down much of your photo editing. Later this week, I will blog about light bulbs. Halogen, LED, incandescent, florescent, warm, cool, high watt, low watt... Wading through the technicalities is confusing! Which is best for product photography, and how can I get the best result for the lowest cost? Later this week, I will tell you!

~Kirsten