Jewelry Photography

Image via Wikipedia

There is good reason why I didn't post more photos of the finished jewelry from the class.  I am almost ashamed to admit how many bad digital photos of jewelry I have taken.  In self-teaching mode, I practiced, read, and looked at others' photos.  Several breakthroughs happened where my quality improved.  One was when I truly understood all the buttons and screen menu options of my camera by (gasp!) reading the manual. 

The second aha moment happened when I unplugged my laptop and the backlight dimmed.  My photos suddenly darkened.  I then tried the same photos on different monitors at home and work and on friends' computer screens.  Every monitor has a different brightness level.  I still have not seen any discussion of monitor brightness effect on digital photos online.  Is there a standard?  Most monitors can be adjusted but I would not expect a prospective buyer to fiddle with her monitor to see my photo clearly!  My HP Pavilion DV6-1354US 15.6-Inch Black Laptop - Up to 4 Hours of Battery Life (Windows 7 Home Premium)laptop screen is vastly brighter when powered by AC than by the battery.  Now that I know, I simply adjust for it by viewing my photos on a desktop monitor. 

In the spirit of sharing, I want to point you to two links that will be very helpful if you are a beginner or even if you are still acheiving perfection in this arena.  I've read highly technical digests on the subject, looked at expensive equipment and software.   Today, I found a site that explains very simply how her photos are taken, proving the KISS method works, and I think with excellent results.  I want to share it with you.  http://pzdesigns.blogspot.com/search/label/tutorial%3A%20photographing%20jewelry

I use a simple Canon PowerShot S410 4MP Digital Elph with 3x Optical Zoomdigital camera, free software, and I admit that I still struggle with light because I don't have access to daylight very often.

Here is the free and easy photo editing software website. You upload your photo, edit it while online and then save it to your computer.   http://www.picnik.com/

Disclosure: This post contains links to an affiliate program, for which I receive a few cents if you make purchases.