Official Luthiers Forum!

I have a friend who is interested in taking some quality photos of my builds and I seem to recall the topic being covered for basics a while back. In searching the forum I only ran across one in the tutorials by John Kitchen--had two links that wouldn't open, though. Any ideas where I could find the info?

Much appreciated everyone!
Howard

I found this article very helpful, especially the tips about adding highlights or filling in dark or shaded parts of the guitar using reflected light:

http://www.nichebooks.com/guitarpix.pdf

The photos below are from my first attempts at fancy guitar photos based on the article. Although there is room for improvement, I'm pretty happy with how they came out. The only thing I invested in to take the photos was a black backdrop. I used my old reliable Canon G12 on a tripod and indirect and reflected sunlight coming through a window. A couple very bright diffuse light sources would be nice to have though so I wouldn't be tied to shooting on a sunny day during certain hours.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

Great info--thanks so much!

Howard

Photography is very important if you're looking to sell your work. It's very common to see terrible photos of work which is actually very good. When it comes to selling guitars it's the eyes that come first, not the ears.

I was faced with a choice of learning the basics myself or paying $1000 a day for the better professionals in my area. I was determined that photography wouldn't become yet another all-consuming bottomless pit for my time and money. I spent nothing on lights and used the camera I already have which you can buy used for about $150.

In three sessions I went from this:



To this:









I'm planning a tutorial video for later in the year...when I get time.

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nigel

http://www.theluthierblog.com

Wow! You and Jay do excellent work, both with and without cameras!!

Nigel, your photos look great. What did you put the guitar on to get the reflection?

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Steve Sollod (pronounced sorta like "Solid")
www.swiftcreekguitars.com

Wow! Both very impressive!

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Pat

On the Luthier Community forum, there was a long-running thread a while ago on photographing guitars. Pretty in-depth, covering basic and also other areas such as lighting, color balance, and the like. You have to join to get on the forum, but it's painless.

http://www.luthiercom.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=875

It's often said that photography is as much about seeing as using the equipment, so really looking at guitar photos (or any photo for that matter) to figure out what makes it work or not work, what the lighting is like, hard or soft, how shadows are used, etc. Lighting is especially important in product photography; this book, Light Science and Magic: An Introduction to Photographic Lighting by Hunter, Biver and Fuqua was invaluable to me for learning how to use light and reflections.







Bringing out the best in your work with photos can be hard work, but it's often worthwhile.

Pat

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formerly known around here as burbank
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http://www.patfosterguitars.com

Thanks for the links to the existing tutorials - they look very useful.

Nigel - I would live to see a tutorial from you as the quality of the photos (and instruments) on your website is great.

cheers

Mark

I always preferred a "natural setting" to "instruments in space", but it's a personal preference. I never used flash, much preferring natural light.
Just as with building instruments, there are no shortcuts to photography. It all takes practice and should be considered a learning experience.

I agree about the use of flash. Point sources of light are to be avoided. Diffuse, bright light is best. I've always admired your photos of instruments. I don't have the great still life kind of backgrounds or access to them that you have so "guitars in space" it is for me.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

Had another go this afternoon:

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nigel

http://www.theluthierblog.com

Haans,

I've always liked your compositions. Thought out, but not contrived.

Nice stuff, Nigel!

Pat

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formerly known around here as burbank
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http://www.patfosterguitars.com

I suck at it. And I've even taken classes on how to do it and have used the best cameras around. Working in a TV studio has given me access to all this stuff. I think photography is as much of an art as anything else and you either have an eye for it or you don't. I don't

This is 'standard' view photography of a violin. It tells you everything about the violin, well as much as any photograph can. It's a small image but the actual real life posters are much larger. There's nothing terribly exciting about it, nothing artistic about it but technically it does convey more than many 'atmospheric' shots. In terms of lighting, unfussy background, sharpness of image etc. it is of a very high quality. There's more than one way to take pictures of musical instruments. It all depends what you wish to convey. Personally I prefer the more 'clinical' approach but then again I'm a maker rather than a buyer. The artistic shots maybe better at selling guitars though.

https://shop.nqsm.com/ugc-1/product/106 ... iginal.jpg