Photography Revisited

Finally the sun came out, although it's gone again already. I did manage to take 150+ photos before it disappeared so here is the post I promised you a while back :)

The turquoise dish background

Photographing my jewelry is something I have been working on for quite some time, as you will know if you read  either of my previous posts on the subject.



I found a few backgrounds for my pictures (such as the turquoise dish and a piece of wood) and I was very pleased with the results. However, I hit a problem when I started making copper jewelry with coloured accents such as beads or coloured wire. On the dark wood background the copper pieces just don't really stand out enough but against a turquoise background any colours in the piece start to look weird. Additionally I really wanted all my items to be pictured on the same background so they would look great all together in my Etsy shop.

Grey background or overexposed earrings?

I tried really hard to master the white background for a while. I did get some success with it but for most images I was left with a choice between a grey background or some horribly over-exposed, colour enhanced piece of jewelry. Now I'm sure with more perseverence (and probably money spent on a light box) I could get good images on a white background every time but I actually think my style of jewelry fits a background better.

My jewelry has rustic, handmade charm whereas a white background (in my mind) speaks of high class elegance, diamonds and gold. I really liked the way my pieces worked with a natural background such as the wood so I found one that would contrast with my items no matter what colour they were - slate. I bought a piece of darkish grey slate (its actually a cheeseboard from Crate and Barrel), confident that it would be perfect but without having the chance to test it out first.

Today I tried it out for the first time and I am very happy with the results. I have yet to see what they will look like all together but the individual pictures are great and I think the slate matches the style of my jewelry perfectly.

Some before and after pictures

Now I have finally sorted out a background I can use for all my items and taken photos of all my new designs I can get on and get them listed. You can preview some of them here in the next few days or on my Facebook page