Product Shot Skills - How to Control Reflection

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Product Shot Skills - How to Control Reflection

Online shopping is very popular these days. A nice product shot that can grab the shopper’s attention is what you need if you want your product to stand out from the rest of the competitions. This article will show you how to deal with reflection - a common problem in product photography.

The Shooting Angle

The difficulty in photographing reflective objects is that it’s hard to control the reflected image. Reflective object is like a piece of mirror. When light hits on an object, it bounces off the reflective surface at exactly the same angle at which it hits it, and then enters into our eyes where an image is formed. As long as we can figure out the reflective angle and adjust the shooting angle accordingly, we should have no problem in controlling reflection.

This shot was taken at a low angle. We can see a reflected image of objects outside the backdrop on the lens surface

Enlarge the photo a bit and we can see that the reflection is actually part of the white ceiling

Increase the shooting angle slightly and the ceiling reflection disappears. Besides, colored rings of light created when light penetrates through the lens coatings are captured, giving the photo a more appealing result

The Shooting Background

We can control the reflection by adjusting the shooting angle. In circumstances where it’s hard to adjust the angle, we can choose to use a clean background to avoid a messy reflection.

By using a black backdrop, a clean reflection off the phone surface is achieved

If we take away the black cardboard and shoot on normal cement surface, the grey ceiling reflection will be seen

In order to avoid gaps and discontinuity in the background, never create backdrop by using two separate sheets of paper. Use a whole piece of paper instead and bend it smoothly.

Use a whole piece of paper as backdrop especially for objects with heights. This will give your photos a more professional look

Avoid Front Reflection

When you need to photograph a reflective object from the front, you will capture the camera and the shooting scene in the reflection. To solve this problem, we can make a hole on the center of a large piece of single-colored cardboard and insert the lens into the hole to shoot.

We can see the photographer reflection on the spoon

Make a hole on the center of a large piece of single-colored cardboard and insert the lens into the hole to shoot

From the order side

By covering the camera with a black cardboard, we can avoid the reflected image of the camera and the photographer

Try out these simple fixes as shown above which can help you control reflection in an easy way. For more DIY tips for taking product shots at home, please refer to the article“DIY Studio Product Shots”