How to Take Product Pictures with your Phone
You made your product with love and put it in gorgeous hand designed packaging. You know you have the best product in its category, and everyone will love it. You just need to sell it. That starts with photographing your product. Whether you put in on your own personal website, Etsy, Amazon Handmade or other online sellers or post on social media. Your pictures need to pop. Online shopping is hard, customers cannot pick up and hold your product, try it out, smell it, etc. So, they rely on your pictures and description to determine if they want to buy. Your product pictures are the first and most important selling point.
You need clean clear pictures, with little to no background or distraction from your product. The lighting should be bright and with minimal shadow, especially on the product itself. If you have wording on your labels, i.e. name, description, etc., that should also be clear and visible. This may sound easy, but it will take some practice, as well as time to set it up correctly.
Photography Surface: Choose a clean non-reflective (preferably white) surface such as a table or even floor (please make sure it is clean and swept) You can also purchase a lightbox. Lightboxes are quite affordable, come in several sizes, collapse for easy storage and are portable. I like this one and use it whenever my studio has be mobile. 12x12 Portable Studio Lightbox. Or this backdrop for a less mobile solution but perfect for larger items and comes with several different color backdrops incase you want to switch it up and play. . Photography Backdrop Small
My product photography studio with backdrop set up in a room in my house.
Background: As with your surface, you want a clean background, preferably white. Why white for the surface and background? Simple, it is clean, non-distracting and draws the eye to the product. Also, if you are putting your products on Etsy or Amazon Handmade, they both prefer (Amazon Handmade especially) a clean white surface and background. If you need to hang a flat white sheet for a backdrop, this will work also, just be sure there are no wrinkles.
Lighting: Natural light may sound easiest and more convenient, but it is not always your friend. Depending on where you are in your space, time of day, etc., natural light can change quickly during your shoot. If you want to use natural light, it is free after all, make sure you are next to a sunny window, for bright but indirect light. If the natural light is not ideal or available (nighttime, cloudy day) Supplementing or even substituting the natural light with other light sources such as a lamp. You can also use a ring light if you have one. Be sure to angle the light source to decrease any shadow or glare on or around the product. If your product has glass, metal or has a clear plastic packaging, glare is not your friend and may take several tries of lighting angles to ensure no or minimal glare. Especially on any wording of your packaging. A note on packaging, you may consider removing it if your main draw is inside, such as earring in a box. It is the actual product your customers want to see, not necessarily the packaging, as pretty as it may be.
Holding your phone: Of course, you can hold your phone with your hands and move around and back and forth to get the best angles and pictures. That is the best part! And I personally love this about my job as a photographer. To get to move, zoom in, zoom out, and just have fun while I am shooting. However, you may want to also consider a tripod. Especially if you are doing overhead shots, video or just unsure of how steady your hands are. I like this one, it even comes with the above-mentioned ring light. Overhead Camera Mount with 10” Selfie Ring Light and Phone Holder. This is also a perfect tool for video and mounts securely to any surface.
Staging: Now that you have your surface, backdrop and lighting taken care of and your phone ready. You need to place your product for staging. If you are going to sell your product on Etsy or Amazon, you will not need to use props. Just your products so as to not distract from the item for sale. (I will have a separate post on taking product pictures for Third Party sellers such as Etsy and Amazon later).
Product with plain white background
I recommend taking two sets of pictures for your product. One set with just your product, no pretty props or frills for your portfolio or any wholesale you may want to do, and one set staged with props to further draw the imagination of your customer.
Props are so much fun and you most likely already have them laying around so no need to spend extra money. For example, if you have maybe a lavender scented candle, maybe some sprigs of lavender at the base of the candle. If you are selling this candle to help your customers sleep, maybe a sleep mask. Your imagination is the limit. Just be sure to not distract from your product. Do not cover any labels or verbiage on your product and try to keep the props to 1 to 2 small props. i.e. 1 sprig of lavender, and a neutral-colored sleep mask behind the candle. (((Insert examples)))
Product with props
Editing: Congratulations! You have now finished taking beautiful pictures of your products! Now as you flip through them on your phone you may love them but notice they are not exactly Instagram ready. (They usually never are) Its always best to edit. You may want to crop or increase or decrease lighting (exposure). Most Android and iPhones already have excellent photo editing software installed but if you but if you want a little extra editing, some great free apps are Snapseed and Lensa if you want some AI powered editing. Adobe Lightroom is also a great app however it is a subscription and geared more toward professionals. However, it is very easy to learn. Just be sure your phots are saved as a JPEG as this is the easiest format to share and post photos. I have an Android phone, you can easily edit by selecting the photo and clicking on the pen icon on the bottom.
Photo editing screen on Android phone
Once you have your photos edited to your liking it is time to save and upload. Please Please Please for your own good, do NOT just save them to your picture gallery on your phone. Please make sure they are saved to a cloud and, maybe a space where you can access them from your PC. This is crucial as your pictures are your money. If they are just saved on your phone and you lose your phone, you lose your pictures. So please save them to a cloud where you can access on multiple devices. This also helps, as I have found uploading pictures to platforms such as Etsy and Amazon Handmade is so much easier on a PC.
Also, on a non-photography note, while you are uploading to online selling platforms or social media, make sure you add clear and concise descriptions. Your picture may clearly show a candle or earrings but people like to read just a little bit what they are looking at. Also, many platforms require Alternative Text for the visually impaired. These descriptions will also help your algorithm when people search for a product.
Now that you have your product pictures, saved enjoy posting to social media, Etsy, Amazon and let the sales roll in!
