Product photography in a studio environment is not the easiest form of photography. Patience, knowledge of light sculpting, and skillful post-processing are required. People also mistakenly think that you have to invest a lot in equipment.
But this is simply not true. There is too much online content praising the effectiveness of cheap devices like speedlights and the like. And it has been proven that you can really get extremely high quality results without using expensive equipment. You just need to practice, and no form of photography can be practiced alone better than product photography.
In this video by Dustin Dolby who passed workphlo on YouTube, he breaks down the incredibly difficult reflective product shoots. The reflective surface is a photography nightmare, but in less than six minutes and with just two lights, he guides viewers through the hardest part, self-portrait, all with Carefully arrange lights, flags and diffusers. Highly reflective surfaces often have to be captured with a combination, and he explains both how and why each successive shot will be used in the final edit. In the second half of the video, he creates a dramatic, distinct, magazine-worthy image, but doesn’t complicate things with messy tools and filters. Selections, layer masks, and a few finishing touches.
I have been passionate about product photography for many years, and what excites me about it is the fact that it is a challenging profession. But channels like workphlo have been helping me achieve success when I was completely stuck on a project. The 42 videos he has on his channel are also more than enough to help you.
