STUDIO PHOTOGRAPHY CASE STUDY

BEL KAI

I was contracted by the CEO of bel kai to create product photography for a newly launched wholesale website and catalog experience. The CEO and I worked through several different looks for photography and landed on a natural feel that incorporated textures she loved like concrete, woven fibers, and wood. However, the goal was to allow the jewelry to rise above any props used to make the photos.

Studio photography allowed me to create highly consistent images with very minimal effort. In fact, I was able to train the CEO to use the lights and create her own images with a similarly high quality.

Challenges

As with all jewelry photography, the biggest challenge was finding ways to use reflection to my advantage. Many of the products have highly reflective surfaces whose colors are easily distorted by other objects in the room.

Although I was mostly successful in minimizing reflections, many images required retouching to achieve the desired effect. Most resin jewelry required small touch-ups to remove glaring imperfections and other distracting reflections. Unlike other projects, dynamic light worked to my advantage as it emphasized the 3D nature of these small products.

Lighting Setup

I primarily used a two-light setup, however these were placed directly across from each other. Although one light was more powerful than the other, they were used to cancel out each other’s reflections. Each light was also tilted away from the product rather than being pointed directly at it to minimize reflections from other objects in the room.

Results

I created a huge library of images that the CEO used on her website and at trade shows. These included images of the different jewelry pieces available in the jewelry bar as well as templates for the CEO to use to create her digital versions.

See more images on bel kai’s website.