Our how-to articles typically explain lighting setups optimized for a specific product without any compromises. This article takes a different direction:
For online sales platforms or auction catalogs, multiple products in various variations and positions need to be documented quickly. As an alternative to purely diffuse lighting solutions offered on the market (light tents, cones, and cubes), this setup demonstrates a quickly adaptable set with two lights.
We are using two pocket watches as objects, both with shiny surfaces, glass elements, and engravings.
The main light source is a Pulso L lamp (without light modifiers) behind a thin, flexible, but strongly diffusing plexiglass sheet. For smooth and shiny surfaces (polished silver, gold, glass), the light can be made softer by slightly increasing the distance between the light source and the diffuser. For more textured surfaces (engravings, gemstones, etc.), this distance is reduced, making the light slightly harder and more intense. A few centimeters of adjustment are sufficient for flexibility.
The medium-sized softbox provides base lighting to the plexiglass panel, ensuring that even with very high-contrast main lighting (short distance between the light source and plexiglass), the darker areas do not become completely black.
To the left of the watch, a white card can be positioned as a reflector, if needed. This reduces contrast and generates additional reflections on shiny parts.
The entire setup remains very soft (even with a strong main light position) and low-contrast. Black elements (in this case, cloths) can be placed in the setup to locally prevent reflections and/or increase contrast. In these examples, the cloths were used to reduce reflections in the watch glass, making the dials appear clearer.
By varying the described parameters, lighting for different objects can be optimized within minutes.
To minimize post-processing time, focus stacking was avoided, and a small aperture was used. The intentionally non-retouched photos were taken with a mirrorless full-frame camera and a 105mm lens. At ISO 160, the aperture was set to 22.0.
