Photography
You know, great photography can happen. I've seen it. I have used professional photographer David Orr for my jury shots for the last several years and I have been thrilled with everything he has done for me. Why is it so hard for me to get even semi decent pictures of my beads and jewelry to post online and in my ETSY shop? I have a photo tent, special studio lights with special bulbs. I have a decent DSLR camera with various lenses and a tripod. I also have a decent point and shoot and a 41 MP camera on my cell phone. I just bought and ordered a special graduated background which can be seen in this photo of a recent set of ivory and silver blue beads I made. I am never happy with my photography of my jewelry and beads. Is it because I took the pictures, and I would have much rather been at the torch than the tripod? Maybe I don’t have the best eye for staging? I just don't know.
A few months ago at one of the bead shows in Tucson, during the annual gem and mineral shows, I sought out a professional photographer who I had been told had a great setup for sale. I really want to buy a kit, or tent or setup that will allow me to just lay out my beads and jewelry, point and click the camera, and voila, beautiful pictures! We happened to interrupt a class in progress. There were 3 people in the room with the photographer, and they seemed to be going through a demo so my friend and I walked in and waited our turn to talk to the photographer while idly whispering about the demo and we were irritably told to shut up by the people in the class because they had paid and we had not! In my defense this was an open door, advertised booth at a tradeshow and there were no signs of any kind indicating there was a class in progress. Oh well.
My friend and I scurried out, half apologetic, half miffed because if you are teaching a paid class, close the dang door and put a sign out! Buy at the end of the day I learned/realized a few things:
The money I pay for professional jury photos is well worth it. I was pretty sure of this already. All the pictures on the slideshow on the homepage of this website are my paid professional jury photos by David Orr.
Photography and especially good photography of jewelry is complicated. I have seen great photos by my peers and either have found the holy grail of photo setups, or they spend a lot more time and energy than I do taking and editing their photos. Or they just have better timing or precision than I do. Or maybe some combination of all these things. In the class I interrupted, they were waving about gray scale cards and talking about all the Photoshop editing to be done after the fact. I just don’t want to deal with that crap!
At the end of the day, I will keep tinkering with my photo set up until I get to a point where I can easily and quickly take pictures of my beads and jewelry that accurately and flatteringly represent my work with a minimum of effort. Until that happens I hope anyone looking at my work through photos and not in person will recognize that I am a better jewelry maker than I am jewelry photographer.
