Digital cameras and photography equipment in auctions

I'm looking into spicing up my auctions (shoes) a little bit and purchasing some nice photography equipment. For those of you who are seasoned sellers or photographers, please make any suggestions. What kind of light box, lighting (watt?), camera (SLR or point and shoot and what model) would you recommend or use and why (what are the benefits)?

If it's just for ebay I'd start with an old Canon 10d/20d or similar, 50mm prime lens and a hotshoe flash with a Gary Fong Lightsphere or an Omnibounce diffuser. Off-camera lighting may be a bit of overkill, as the diffuser spreads quite well.

What are you currently using?

At the moment just a Canon a520 Point and shoot on a wood table background with flash.

An nice digital SLR will do a great job, but you should be able to get excellent results with just about any point and shoot. The biggest thing is lighting. My father just got a little portable lighting setup for christmas, I don't know the brand or I'd link it. It has two lights and a plain backdrop that is reversible to be either light or dark. You don't want to use the on-camera flash at all. It will always create weird shadows.

you may want to invest in some large pieces of white cardboard and build yourself a totally white backdrop. then get a strong white light and reflect that off an umbrella onto your setup. the camera you use isn't really an issue, since the photos on ebay won't need a really high resolution anyway. any camera with at lesat 5.1mp will be fine. and i repeat: a SLR is NOT going to make your photos look better, i have both a P&S and a nikon d80 dSLR, and the only advantages my d80 has over the P&S is, faster processing, and more mp. SLR's basically give you more manual controls to tinker with. for something like a still item in a box, it should be no problem to use a P&S.

Yeah, I know I don't need an SLR but it would be a nice excuse to get a new toy.

Say I had a good point and shoot camera...would a back drop be preferable to a light box?

What lights would I need and where would they need to be arranged?

if you get a dSLR, go with nikon =D

backdrop or box, it's your choice. i personally started out with backdrops, and moved onto a light box. the backdrops were easier for me because i also used it as a backdrop for photographing people portraits and all i had to do was change the background. needless to say my ebay items usually were much smaller in comparison to my 6 foot backdrops. for lights you'll need to go for some tungsten lights, i use a 75W. floodlamps do a good job. there are many tutorials online and googling it will turn up a wealth of them.

Originally Posted by distinctive

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Yeah, I know I don't need an SLR but it would be a nice excuse to get a new toy.

Say I had a good point and shoot camera...would a back drop be preferable to a light box?

What lights would I need and where would they need to be arranged?

Hi distinctive,


I PMed you the photography advice I got from Chuck Franke of Carlo Franco fame.

Like the others, he basically said that the lighting is the key to good Ebay photos.

Here's his recommendations:

Pictures are the easy part - lighting is the hard part!!! We used a Sony Mavica on everything until 2 months ago when someone stole it and now I am using a Nikon D-50. It is a fabulous device but a pain ********** to learn. The real trick in taking good pictures is your lighting though. I built a frame around the dummy and shoot lights in through a diffusion screen (ie, nylon sheet) and then light from the front with one purchased and two homemade soft box lights. I use fluorescent so as not to get baked in the studio on August Dallas afternoons.

Let me know what your setup is like and how you have it lit and I will be glad to offer some tips if I can.

My project right now is figuring out how to take better pics of our ties (www.carlofranco.com)



Generally the two things you have to learn are

A.Double or triple the light in the room
B.Make sure all of that light is of the same color temperature and then set the white balance on your camera to match.


I'm running about 800 Watts of fluorescent lighting spread across 11 bulbs at daylight temps - 5000-5500K.



Here's a cool lightbulb for photography or if you just reallllly want to attract every moth in Houston to your window to get eaten by the geckos:

http://www.electrical-supply.net/pro..._prodID_E_2960



That one puts out more light than a 1000W tungsten bulb and it is white, white, white light. Just note the dimensions, it ain't going into a small fixture. If you are a real geek like me you can take two of those, two of the clamp reflector lights at home depot, two large lampshades and a little white nylon fabric and build two softboxes to diffuse your light. Whatchya do is spraypaint the interior of the lampshades in white or reflective silver then epoxy the shade into a 15" aluminum reflector and cover the wide end with the sheer white fabric. Two of those, each 45 degrees left and right of your subject and you will get a smoothe light that "˜wraps' around your subject without harsh shadows. Two softboxes for around $100 or less with that setup. Then I have the extra large softbox from Amvona (often can be had for $150 on ebay rather than $800. The bulb in it sucks so I replaced it with another one of the big compact fluorescents and now all is well.

I've been selling toys on eBay for over a year now. I'm not sure if my advice will help you. 1. If you're going to be doing this as a way to sell things you no longer wear, the whole lighting rigs and everything can get very space consuming when you're not selling anything. 2. A light box is great for small items. But large items, you might have a problem with size. You can make your own light box by cutting out a large cardboard box and leave the corner edges of the box and then tape wax paper there and then place a white piece of paper running underneath and behind the item. Don't fold the white paper so it looks like an infinitely white background and not white paper. 3. I personally would go with white posterboard (find it at an office stationary store). 4. If you want an excuse to get an SLR, do it. SLR's will allow you to adjust the aperture. With a lot of P&S cameras, you're stuck with an artificial brain that doesn't know how much depth should be in focus. With something like shoes, you want the entire shoe in focus and shoes can range in depth from about 4 inches shot from the side to about 12 inches shot from front to back. With an adjustable aperture setting, you'll get the entire shoe in focus. 5. With high aperture setting, you'll need a camera that can either have a longer physical exposure time (shutter speed), adjustable digital exposure setting (the "film ISO), or you'll need a really bright light. When you set the aperture high, you're making the size of the pinhole that allows light into the camera very very tiny, so less light exposes onto the "film." So you'll need more light or you'll need to allow the hole to stay open longer. If you allow shutter speed to slow, your jerky hands may make the photo blurry, so you may need a tripod. Or just use this as an excuse to buy a very powerful flash. With a flash, so much light hits the object that the light bounces back and even with a fast shutter, there is enough volume of light that your photo comes out correctly. Flashbulbs are not cheap, maybe another $300 at the cheapest. But another excuse for a nice toy that will come in handy at birthdays, weddings, other events. You don't want to mess with the ISO too much or you'll introduce grain and other digital artifacts into the photo that may be seen by the buyer as an imperfection in the product. If you have a shiny polished shoe, you don't want to ruin it with a grainy photo. 6. With a powerful camera flash bulb, just point it upwards when taking the photo and you will get the effect of a light box that diffuses light everywhere and you won't get shadows. And the flash bulb takes less space than having riggings and umbrellas and everything else. 8MP SLR from Canon = $600-700. Flash bulb = $300. A good place to find example photos from cameras from users is http://www.pbase.com/cameras . There you will find all the makes and by clicking on one, you will see photos submitted by users from that exact camera. Pbase users are more on the high end of things so your mileage may vary.

I looked at your current photos from your ebay listings. The current result isn't bad so I think you can stick with your P and S and go with a light diffuser. I suspect you really just want a brand new toy and this is just an excuse.I think the main problem is the glare from direct flash from your P and S camera.

But some of your close ups has a problem with aperture setting you just can't get from a P and S such as this shot: http://www.auctiva.com/hostedimages/...0,0,0&format=0 . Notice how the bottom of the shoe is in focus, the top of the back and stitching are out of focus, and the inside of the shoe is in focus. Getting good depth of focus is a problem with close up shots. All of your other photos seem good to me. But I've studied enough economics to know that sales may improve with better detailed, close up photos, especially for fine products that require attention to fine detailing such as shoes.

I've been looking at your listings and because you're mainly selling shoes and the volume is quite high, I think you may want to go with a light box. But light box is tricky when trying to angle the shoe in a way to get a detailed shot and you really can't stick the camera in the light box or it'll defeat the purpose of the light box. If you want detailed shots, go with the SLR and all the manual controls it gives you. Hell, since you can make a lightbox with a cardboard box and some wax paper, just make the lightbox and buy an SLR. You know you want to.

here's an easy way to have a variable sized light box:

1. get 4 wooden rods, 3-4 feet each, all the same height

2. buy a white bedsheet

3. spread bedsheet over the bottom, sides and top of the box. leave 1 side open. tape/nail the cloth to the posts to make it taut if your posts keep falling over

4. shine a tungsten bulb from the back/top of the opening; it'll diffuse througout the "box" that you have made

5. (optional) shine a smaller 75W bulb from the front to give you an even glow

Here, I did the homework for you: http://digital-photography-school.co...ve-light-tent/

the camera you use isn't really an issue, since the photos on ebay won't need a really high resolution anyway. any camera with at lesat 5.1mp will be fine. and i repeat: a SLR is NOT going to make your photos look better

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I have to strongly disagree with this. Every time I have upgraded my camera the difference in final picture quality has been huge, even though the size of the edited/cropped picture for ebay stays the same. For instance, the difference in quality between my 8 megapixel Olympus C-8080 and my brothers new Nikon D40:



vs:



The lighting and editing program for those two pics was identical, the only difference was the camera.

Originally Posted by A Harris

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I have to strongly disagree with this. Every time I have upgraded my camera the difference in final picture quality has been huge, even though the size of the edited/cropped picture for ebay stays the same. For instance, the difference in quality between my 8 megapixel Olympus C-8080 and my brothers new Nikon D40:

vs:

The lighting and editing program for those two pics was identical, the only difference was the camera.

Wait, are you saying the second picture is better quality? Cause I see fine details in the tie in the second that I do not see in the first. It would be nice if they two suits were the same. At first, I thought it was and that the camera's color was way off and the suit's color changed. It does appear that the shirt and tie are the same and the color has changed a bit for the shirt, the bust, and the background wall.

The problem with people's perception of megapixels is that it is their only criteria for cameras. The problem with PandS cameras is that they have huge MP count (since the technology has gotten cheaper) but horrible lenses. As a student studying to enter the optometry field, lenses matter a lot. The lens will affect how the light enters the camera and is exposed onto the camera's photoreceptors. Poor lens material can produce all sorts of blue and red shifts as well. A crappy lens with high MP will just mean you get very clear distorted photos or very accurate blue and red shifts. I just don't trust electronically controlled lenses that protrude in and out of PandS cameras. They seem flimsy whereas SLR lenses look like finely tuned instruments.

If you want to step up your eBay sales, you'll have to get an SLR.

The irony is that I sell cheap toys and use an SLR while you sell expensive shoes and use a P and S (to the OP).

BTW, A Harris, the size of your photos are acceptable for eBay? Don't you think the loading time is a bit longer and that may hurt sales or views. I guess for your product, people want to see fine detail though. I would think loading times would be a problem. Any info would be helpful. Thanks.