HOW TO TAKE PROFESSIONAL PHOTOS AT HOME
Take advantage of shelter-in-place orders to hone your indoor photography skills and achieve the perfect photoshoot at home!
All pictures are from Travel video Journalist Juliana Broste
Instagram @TravelingJules,
Website: www.julianabroste.com
The global health crisis has stranded most of us indoors, away from public spaces and other people. For photographers, this means challenging your creativity and finding a way to create interesting and quality content from the confines of your own home. When you’re no longer able to shoot outside, you’ve got to diversify – learn to shoot photos of food, products and portraits, so you can be sure to continue honing your photography skills even from home.
For the photographer trapped at home, here are our tips for the perfect photoshoot at home!
Food Photography – How to Take Good Photos at Home
With fewer activities to keep themselves occupied, people are turning to cooking in droves, so much so that staple items like flour, eggs and yeast have flown off the shelves and become difficult to find. You’re already going to try to make that sourdough bread, so why not learn about taking professional photos at home too?
If you’ve never tried your hand at food photography before, here are a few tricks to keep in mind for shots so good your viewers will want to reach through the screen and take a bite.
When it comes to food photography there are 3 main angles that will become your “bread and butter”: ¾ view, overhead, and straight-on. Three quarters works wonders, keeping the subject just above eye level, but not overhead – it’s perfect if you have limited space, since it doesn’t require much in terms of background. Overhead angles work well when trying to show an entire array of subjects, while images that take the subject straight-on show the subject right at eye level and channel the viewers gaze immediately. For these angles, try using some different backdrops for food photography and a trusty tripod to take the frustration out of your food photography and get each of these angles just right, thanks to the 90 central column that can go horizontal.
Manfrotto’s tripods, like the 190 Aluminium 3-Section TripodandXPRO Ball Heador 3Way Tripod Head kits are easy to set up and take down, andand the tripod heads let you find every angle easily. Otherwise, if you find that you don’t need the height that these tripods provide when shooting your culinary creations, try the Pixi EVO2-Section Mini Tripod, whose max height is 8 inches, and weighs in at half a pound. Il Pixi EVO lo suggerisco per le foto di soggetto, per scattare il behind the scene.
Otherwise, if you really a beginner and want to get into food photography with something even more intuitive and easy to use, you can start with a 290 Tripod.
The longer people are stuck inside, the more they are turning to online retail, making it an opportune moment to learn how to take product photos at home. When it comes to product photography, lighting and backgrounds can really make the difference between a photo that sells and one that doesn’t.
Here’s a few tips for how to take studio photos at home: the key for ending up with a great product photo is to provide consistency between images using a camera support. Manfrotto’s 290 Dual Aluminum Kit with a 3-way tripod head or ballheadwill help you achieve the consistency between shots so you’re sure to end up with the right image for your product. If your camera equipment is pretty heavy and you want to rely on extra stiffness, the Manfrotto 190 Aluminium Kit 3 section with XPRO 3-way head or magnesium XPRO Ball head.
When it comes to lighting in product photography, there are a lot of factors to consider: which will enhance the product’s look, artificial light or natural light? Is it better to soften the shadows with filler lighting or bounce the light with a reflector? Does the product look better in hard light or should you use a diffuser to soften it? The answers to these questions all depend both on the product and qualities you are trying to highlight as well as the backgrounds that you use to do so. No matter the answer, you’ll find the tools you need for the photos you want by browsing Manfrotto’s photography lighting equipment.
If you are “sheltering in place” with another person, it’s the perfect opportunity to practice portrait photography. Those who already work with portrait photography know that it can be as lucrative as it is entertaining, just something to keep in mind once social distancing restrictions have been lifted!
For good portraits, having the right tool for the job is important, so consider setting up your home the same as how to set up your studio for portrait photography. An important part of portrait photography is being able to control your lighting setup, including the quality, quantity, and direction of light. In portrait photography, natural lighting is often preferred over artificial light, but you can always control your lighting with Manfrotto’s photography lighting equipment, so you’re sure to always have the right quantity and quality of light.
For portrait photography, tripods like the 190 Carbon Fibre 3-Section or the 190go! Carbon Fibre 4-sectiontogether with the magnesium XPRO Ball Head make sure that you have all the height and maneuverability you need when shooting portraits. Since they are made out of carbon fiber, they are also light enough to pack up and take with you on the go, while being sturdy enough to support your gear when you eventually venture back into the outside world. And if you want to go further and take also some “behind the scenes” shots, our suggestion is to use a super compact Pixi EVO!