Jewelry Pictures

The following  instructions for taking good jewelry pictures are intended to be a simple guide for non professional photographers, since I am not a pro myself (very far from it!). After experiencing many years of bad jewelry pictures, I am finally now shooting some good looking pictures and would like to share some tricks to make your jewelry picture taking life a little easier.

The techniques for taking pictures of jewelry items such as rings, pendants, earrings, watches and other objects slightly differs from one another but the principles are similar for all. Since most items are slightly different in size, depth and also type and color of metals as well as sizes and colors of stones, each different item may require individual camera adjustments. The techniques for taking jewelry pictures also will depend on the setup that you are using.

The camera

There is no need a zillion megapixel camera unless you are planning to print large size pictures.  I use 1.2 megapixels for the pictures that will be used in the internet. If you are printing these pictures or blow their size up, then you will have to setup your picture with more megapixels.

Make sure that your camera can be used in the manual mode and that you can perform a manual white balance adjustment by following your camera manual of instructions. This white balance setting will hold for all pics within the same picture environment that you used for calibration of the white balance. For this reason, you may want to prepare all the jewelry that you want to photograph under the same conditions and shoot them all at once. Prepare means clean and polish!

Other important settings in your camera are the aperture and speed. I highly recommend that you play with these settings on your own camera; I have been getting good results in shutter speed 15, aperture 5.0

The camera always must be mounted on a tripod. When you are ready to take your pic, setup the camera in the self-timer position so you don’t have to touch the shutter button, this will keep the camera in the right position and there will not be a chance for movement of the camera while photographing the item.

You should always use your camera in the manual mode in order to decide where you want the sharpest (most focused) part of your item.

I always shoot jewelry in the macro mode at a distance of about 6 inches (15 centimeters) away from the piece. If you have to get further away from the piece to get a good shot, you can also upgrade the resolution (pixels) of your camera and use a picture editor to enlarge the picture, using the portion that you intended to show in your picture. If you get too close to the piece, some parts of the jewelry photograph will be blurry.

The item should never receive direct light from a source; otherwise you will see the light bulbs mirrored on the surface of the item photographed. The environment should not be fully lighted in order to avoid direct reflection on the item. If the lights are too bright, avoid direct reflection of the light on the surface of the piece being photographed by using a heavy piece of white cloth (the size of a pillow cover or larger).

Use one or more pieces of white, black or colored cardboard or paper and move them around the piece of jewelry that you are photographing in order to produce brightness, darkness or the color effect that will make your piece stand out best. These cardboard or papers can be of any size, from half a page to a full 8” x 11” page size. When you get the right contrast, then set the piece or pieces of cardboard. You can use jeweler’s third hands to keep these in place or just scotch tape.

Background stage and props

Pick a theme that you like. The theme can be assembled by using objects, flowers, a piece or many pieces of material, cloth or a textured paper or ceramic. Pick a color or a set of colors that will enhance the object that you are about to photograph.

When I shoot a ring or pendant I often use a flat (non shiny) ceramic tile for the background. If I want to keep my piece standing (such as a ring), I use bees wax to hold my piece in place at the position that I desire to show the piece and always making sure that the wax is fully hidden from the camera lens, otherwise the picture will have to go through individual editing and this task is usually very time consuming.  Earrings can be on a fancy earring holder or on a surface with holes pre-made to best display them.

Not all cameras work the same and you will have to adjust your own to see what works best for you. As you do your own testing, make sure that you keep track of your camera settings.

You may want to photograph the same item with a little number next to it and keep track of the settings that you used in each one of your pictures taken. After you examine these pictures in your computer screen, then you will know what the best setting for your camera is.

I like spending the minimum photo editing possible in order to maximize my work time. My photo editing is usually limited to shrinking and cropping the size of the picture as well as adjusting the color of the object and background.

Taking pictures of jewelry can be a very difficult task. Jewelry items are highly reflective and will not yield good results, unless special steps are practiced in preparation for the taking of the picture.

Making your piece of jewelry look its best should be your number one priority when you list your item for sale on the web. The picture is a main key ingredient for a completed sales transaction.