New Cameesa Product Shots [Simple tutorial on Digital Photography]
I learned a very valuable lesson this week: an entrepreneur must wear many hats and, at times, he must learn how to make his own hats too. I was relying on a few friends and professional photographers to give me some pointers about taking new Cameesa product shots; fortunately, they were very busy and I decided to learn Digital Photography on my own. Within a few hours I realized that the basics are actually pretty simple, and we were off to new product shots in no time.
Here is a quick explanation of digital photography and our new product shots.
When it comes to digital photography there are 4 important factors you must consider: lighting, film speed/ISO(sensitivity to light), aperture(amount of light), and shutter speed(time exposed to light).
Lighting
For quality shots, you want a well-lit background and an even better-lit subject. Mark Apsolon has a great video on which lighs to use in your photo shoot.
In our case, we had five lights, two diffused lights shinning on the background wall, and three lights illuminating the subject (Andy). Moreover, Andy stood 6.5 feet in from the background so his shadow did not appear in the shots.
Film Speed/ISO
The film speed determines the saturation of the colors in the photograph. Fast film (ie. ISO 80) requires a shorter exposure to the subject, and requires very good lighting; on the other hand, slow film requires (ie. ISO 1600) a longer exposure, but can be taken in darker areas. If you are in a well-lit place, and objects are standing-still, then you want a low ISO, like ISO 80. However, if you are shooting something in a dark place, or are shooting fast-moving scenes, then you want something like ISO 1600. Keep in mind that a high ISO number correlates to granularity in your pictures, so your pictures may come out blotchy.
 |
| ISO 100 on left; ISO 3200 on right |
In our case, we shot all of our pictures with ISO 80 in a well-lit environment.
Aperture (f-number)
Aperture controls the amount of light that gets into the camera. The higher the f-number, then the less light will get into the camera, and more of the scene will be in focus; for example, f/32 will let little light into the camera and the entire scene will be in focus. In addition, if you want the background to be blurry and the subject to be very focused and stand-out, then you should use a low f-number such as f/2. Basically, aperture is used to adjust the depth of field in the picture. Keep in mind that as you zoom in, the aperture may increase automatically.
 |
 |
| f/5 - wide aperture | f/32 - narrow aperture |
In our case, we used f/2.8 for all of our full t-shirt pictures because we wanted the background to be blurry and the subject to stand out.
Exposure Time/Shutter Speed
Shutter speed controls the amount of time that the subject is exposed. A fast shutter (1/500 sec.) can stop droplets of a waterfall because it is a quick snap, and has a short exposure time; however, a slow shutter (1 sec.) speed can get that motion blur of a waterfall in moving pictures because the shutter is open for a longer time. In terms of a stand-still picture, you want an exposure of about 1 second or a little lower so you can absorb the colors in the entire scene.
 |
| Long exposure of 25 seconds |
In our case, the exposure was usually around 1/50 second so the colors in the picture were taken correctly
Summary
Majority of our pictures were shot at an ISO 80, with an aperture of f/2.8, and an exposure time 1/50 of a second. Hope you guys learned a little about picture taking, and feel free to give us feedback on our new Cameesa product shots.
For more information
Check out this Tutorial on taking digital pictures.
Congrats to 
