Jewelry Photography Question

[Maui Kim]

Quick question: My sister is a jewelry artist. She wants to take pictures of her Jewelry. She has a Rebel XT and the kit lens. I have explained the benefit of a better lens but thats not going to happen! She was using the camera on auto macro mode and she was getting to much background blur. She wants the whole piece of Jewelry in focus. She was using the center focus point. I have told her to put the camera in AV mode at about f11-f16 and try it out. Her pictures are taken out doors in cloudy conditions. I was just wondering if anyone had any advice I could give her for settings, shutter speed, iso, auto focus, ect. I haven't tried much jewelry photography so I was unsure..any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks:)

Here is an example of auto macro. This is what she dosen't want. The entire bracelet needs to be in focus
http://i161.photobucket.com/albums/t213/aiharavisuals/cid_004701c77a7121d181e061a40842Kal.jpg

[strmrdr]

put it on velvet that is a contrasting color, back off, small aparture, shoot and crop.
Or buy her a macro lens for her birthday....

[strmrdr]

btw a p&s will often work much better for this kind of shooting at another place I hang out consumers with cheap p&s cameras are now getting as good or better shots than the pros with 10s of thousands of dollars worth of equipment.

[strmrdr]

.42ct h&a super-ideal cut diamond, 3mm rubies.
p&s camera.
2nd shot is the pro shot of the ruby wrap.

[Maui Kim]

Thanks for the advice. She was using a point and shoot and getting good results. I think she shouldn't have "upgraded".

[René Damkot]

She was using a point and shoot and getting good results.

Off course: The P&S has a lot more DoF at the same aperture...

As strmrdr said: Stop down to f16 or so, and don't stand too close: That way you won't fill the frame, but gain DoF.

There's a thread here (http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=266599) you might want to read...

[Maui Kim]

Thanks Rene for the link and for the advice.

[chtgrubbs]

.42ct h&a super-ideal cut diamond, 3mm rubies.
p&s camera.
2nd shot is the pro shot of the ruby wrap.

The "pro" stinks as a jewelry photographer. I think he or she must be a wedding photographer who is trying to get one of those romantic, atmospheric shots of the ring like they use in wedding albums. It is definitely not the work of a competent commercial pro.

[Sathi]

Does she want to take pics of her jewelry outdoors only? Because if not she might want to try the DIY lightbox that is in this thread:

http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=281524

I have not built one yet, but I will soon as I am very impressed with the quality of the pics. If you click through the thread I beleieve there should be some jewelry examples in there.

[jacobsen1]

If she wants everything in focus a P&S will work better honestly.
But if she wants to use a rebel, she needs to get the object parallel to the "film plane" as much as possible to the DOF will include the whole piece. IE shoot top down on a flat view and at f/8 everything will be in focus. But that's boring... So give it SOME angle, but not as much as she did there and it will help a lot. Beyond that the highest f stop she can get and a tripod if she can.

I do this at work all day long and we use a 50mm f1.8 and kenko tubes. (I own TS-Es, but they were bought for landscape work, not product shots).

this is with nifty and tubes:
http://www.pbase.com/benjacobsen/image/73272890/original.jpg
I can't show anything we make (that's my personal [fake] watch) because we're contract manufactures.
Ben

[Thornfield]

A tripod is a must for this kind of photography, that way she can make slight alterations to the setup without moving the camera.

[jacobsen1]

A tripod is a must for this kind of photography, that way she can make slight alterations to the setup without moving the camera.

Actually it's not. I shoot everything here at work w/o one. I use 2 HD 500w halogen lights to throw out enough light that I can get 1/90th at f/4 at ISO 200. A tripod will help make them clearer and allow much greater DOF, but it's not necisary if you don't have one. Just a LOT of light.

Ben

[johnms88]

Heres a shot I like to do at weddings (And by that I mean, I have only done it once...lol)

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b35/johnms88/IMG_0090.png

I prefer that the whole ring isn't in focus for that kind of shot, but for bracelets and the sort, just use a big aperture and a tripod.