My Photo Setup Revealed

[Warren]

Here's an old picture of my setup. It's constructed of PVC pipe and trash bags. I use poster board as a "sweep", the curvature of which gives a less flat look to the background. I have all kinds of colors and some patterns. The lights are cheap goose-necks with daylight balanced florescent bulbs, I've since added a third lamp affixed to the top of the box and a curtain for the front to minimize reflections. I bought all of this stuff at Home Depot and Staples for around fifty dollars.
I sometimes use diffused flash as you can see and a piece of trash bag works OK but I now have a Sto-Fen "omni bounce" attachment for my flash which is better. I like to arrange the watches on a movable surface to aid with chasing away reflections, the goose-necks are also helpful in this regard. I move everything including the camera around quite a bit to frame my shots the way I want them.
Well that's basically how I do it. Let's see some of your secrets!

[CHIP]

Thanks Warren!
I know another good photographer but he never shared his secrets...
So glad that you are the sharing kind!

So you use flash when you take pictures? None of my pics are taken with the flash on. Since I always have the built in flash, there is no way for me to change the direction of it and while I tried covering it with paper to difuse some of it... it did more damage than help...

[Adam]

Warren,

I remember the first time you posted that I went to home Depot that very day and bought myself some PVC.

As I started to tape on garbage bags, my wife was looking at me like I was crazy

It really works great though, thanks for the "secret revealed"

[Warren]

Like I said at the time, "It ain't rocket science" but to the innocent bystander it must look like crazy behavior and to what end? What normal person takes pictures of watches? I do! and I'm as normal as this little green Guy

[erik]

Warren.

This morning i did also make a lightbox.
I will test it this afternoon.

[Warren]

I just checked, and mine is missing!

[MartynJC (UK)]

This was the setup for some of my best ones:





result:

[erik]

Very nice Martyn.

A good lightbox or a good camera doesn't mean it will take nice pics.
Even the best photographer can take the most beautiful pics with the cheapest camera.

[Sam]

erik said:

A good lightbox or a good camera doesn't mean it will take nice pics.

I'll vouch for that!

[mike]

sam said:

erik said:

A good lightbox or a good camera doesn't mean it will take nice pics.

I'll vouch for that!

I could be a poster child for that statement!!