It’s been a few weeks since we’ve had a photo critique, so let’s get back into the swing of things and take a closer look at this week’s volunteer, a very cool jewelry boutique called Rutigliano Design.
To start with, we absolutely love this boutique … the jewelry is simply outstanding. The first thing that we notice about the photography is that there’s a bit of a mixed bag for the main images … some are low key, some high key, some model shots. In general, the images are very nicely done, but we feel that a bit more of a consistent approach might be helpful here. One approach may be to keep the main image as either a low or high key product shot (to keep things looking clean and professional on the main boutique page) and include a secondary model shot for every piece as an alternate view.
The low key images look great, and really make the products pop, but some of the high-key images could use a little lighting help. The designer says this about her images:
I think the main thing I always have trouble with is keeping the true color of my stones while maintaining the clarity of a picture. For example, The Ruby Necklace, and then some of the beaded earrings. I can never seem to get the lighting right. It is either too grey and you can see the stone ok, but it’s a dark picture, or I get the picture to be light enough and it washes out the stones.
One approach to this problem that might be helpful is to light the background and product separately – this will allow you to tweak the lighting of each independently, getting the lighting just right on the jewelry as well as the backdrop.
In general, we think this designer is doing an excellent job representing her products … she obviously puts a lot of effort into her photography. We truly don’t have a lot of negative things to say here, which is always nice! We would certainly recommend using a few more alternate views whenever possible, as well as more model shots. Many of the item descriptions don’t give exact sizing, and the model shots are a great way to give shoppers an idea of scale. And, of course, it’s always fun to see how things look on!
Keep up the great work, and we look forward to hearing what others have to say about this designer’s photography.
Questions? Comments? Email us at julie[at]smashingdarling[dot]com or feel free to comment below. Thanks as always to our community for your insight and support! So, who’s next? Would you like your store critiqued? Email us at the above address and let us know what you need help on with your photos.
