If this is stuff that fits on a table. The easy solution would be a dedicated photo system. Basically you would grab a normal computer, a couple HD webcams and some lights. Now the process becomes, Set item for pictures on table. watch monitor while setting the item up for best angles. Hit the capture button a couple times. Move the item around and repeat. Remove the item and place next item. Repeat as needed.
For the table I would move it so ONLY the lights you control light it. That gives you more control. Either build a solid table out of heavy wood or steel so the table is stable. Paint it a medium FLAT gray. Make an easy to remove backdrop with the same color.
The cameras get mounted from a couple of flexible mounts so they can be adjusted easily.
I envy that setup. My lunar eclipse photos were bare camera only. Out of 200 frames I finally got a half dozen that worked well. Tough job without a real telescope.
Iggy, I'm pretty clueless on digital cameras, but I'm gearing up to buy my first one for professional work (it probably will be a Sony Alpha NEX-5N), and I can tell you what's been on my mind.
All of the problems I've had with cameras have been mechanical. My Nikon F is on its second set of mirror bumper-stops and its third shutter. My Nikkormat is on its second shutter release. My Schneider view-camera lenses and my Caltar have all had shutters replaced.
I pound my cameras hard. I bought my film in 100-foot rolls and sheet film in Pro-Packs. In copy work, I've shot as many as 1,000 shots per day.
I don't want another SLR. That's why I'm looking at the Sony. Its CCD chip is as large as the best SLRs and its shutter delay is 0.02 sec. Fro $30 I can get an adapter for all of my Nikon F-series lenses. I don't even remember how many I have. Now we're talkin'.
What I really don't know is the model-by-model reliability of any of them. I'm using my wife's Fuji FinePix F30 for the shots I take for online magazines, and that little sucker is trouble-free. All I can say is that I'll trust electronics more than mechanics for high-volume photography, and you're talking high-volume.
The vast majority of what I've done over the past four decades has been industrial, which is what you're talking about, and manual setup is no hardship for that kind of work. In fact, I much prefer it. You don't need features. You need quality and reliability. With the latest generation of non-SLRs with big chips, you may find something that's bullet-proof and somewhat cheaper.
Anyway, that's what's been guiding me as I search for a new camera.
This is a good list. Regarding item 9, many digital cameras come with a media cable so you can display what usually appears on the camera's small display screen on a video monitor. This can really speed things up when taking a series of product pictures because you don't have to look at a little screen while framing the picture.
Regarding the Olympus C-4000 and C-3030 that Gunner recommended, keep in mind they use SmartMedia chips, with storage limited to a small fraction of that offered by CompactFlash or SD. This might not make any difference if you only use USB for picture transfers and if you automate the camera control so you don't have to delete pictures manually. - max size 128MB - max size 128GB - max size 2TB
Top speeds of SmartMedia are 2MB/s (per link above) while CompactFlash has speeds (available at higher price) up to several times faster, and SD several times faster than that. But to get those higher speeds of picture storing you have to find and buy the faster chips, and should have a camera that supports both faster picture writing and faster transfer. However, an advantage of cheaper cameras, even if slower, is that you could use more of them, and could have two or three picture angles set up for simultaneous shots.
Many Canon cameras can be internally re-programmed by user for specific purposes. See . For less radical approaches see Canon's camera-control software development kits at
All the more reason to avoid using flash if possible.
Avoid $50 cameras because you do not have any control over the exposure. Get a camera with independent control of aperture and exposure time as well as exposure compensation so reflection off a white wall does not swamp the dark object in front of it
For small stuff macro mode is a must as well as tripping the shutter without touching the camera on a tripod (I do not have a cable so I use a 2-second timer).
A light box for small items is highly desirable. You don't need to spend a ton. I made mine for about $5:
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I use a Cannon A720IS. My previous camera was also a Cannon. I like the option of both non-rechargeable and rechargeable batteries.
I think you are asking a bit much of the people he described. They aren't professional photographers in any reach - except that he's paying them to take pictures. A properly working AUTO setting would be better.
A room painted white works pretty well, as does a large shop-made tent.
With a studio flash, there is no problem getting enough light, so great efficiency isn't needed. The objective is to have enough light so the camera can stop down (giving great depth of field). With light, the setup becomes non-critical.
Specular reflactions are a bane of industrial photography, and light tents or other diffusion can make things easier. I use a couple of sheets of drafting paper for small objects.
But the other bane is a lack of contrast, which a light tent makes even worse. So sharp lighting sometimes is needed. One recent article I wrote and photographed has three photos in it -- really pedestrian industrial illustration -- and I had to use on-camera flash on all three to avoid undifferentiated shadows.
I shot all three both ways, with diffused light and with harsh, on-camera flash. In each case, I needed the direct flash.
Something like Iggy's work probably won't allow time or expertise to play with lighting, so a light tent, or a couple of big transmission umbrellas, would be a good all-around solution that does the job most of the time. "Black-on-black" shadows are the biggest killer in that type of work and overall diffusion at least solves that problem.
The result will be some annoyingly flat photos, but that's better than shadows in which you can't see anything. If it were me setting it all up for a non-expert photographer to do the work, I'd use two big lights, each at 45 degrees from the lens axis, or maybe 60 degrees, and I'd hang really big drafting-paper sheets in front of each. The ideal is to have the sheets as far from the lights, and as close to the subject, as possible. I'd use light stands and gaffer's clips (spring clips, like big clothes pins) to hold the diffusion sheets. Sometimes I do the same thing with transmission umbrellas. Regular reflection umbrellas don't work out very well for that task because they are too far from the subject and you don't get enough diffusion.
If one is doing a lot of this, a relatively inexpensive umbrella could be a good investment. I got one that can reflect, or the black backing can be removed and light passed through it. This is similar to mine:
I've picked up several 60's era light bars dirt cheap at yard sales and set them up on cheap tripods, bouncing light off the ceiling.
There's all manner of very inexpensive ways to light things and soften the light to avoid glare and flash hot spots.
A fleece throw from Walmart in an appropriate color actually works surprisingly well for the purpose and is dirt cheap. As a bonus, it will keep you warm in an emergency (for certain values of "warm" and "emergency").
For really small items, I've had good luck with plastic stretchy UPS shipping bags. They do good at not reflecting annoyingly, but just enough that it helps cut back on shadows.
Certainly not a professional solution, but they're also pretty much free. I wouldn't necessarily suggest this as a professional solution though.
As has been mentioned numerous times, good lighting. However, good light levels don't require bright high-wattage halogens.. CFLs rated for 6k+ degrees Kelvin are typically labeled Daylight or Sunlight models, and digital cameras seem to work very well with them , IME.
A backdrop can be about any kind of non-reflective material, and bending up some conduit can make a cheap, lightweight frame for holding the material.. some items will photograph more clearly with either a light or dark backdrop, so turn the frame around for a different colored material (or use something like extended retractable blinds to roll them up when not being used). I know you like the cheap aspect, and a lightweight conduit frame is very portable.
All true, but situation dependent. But with machine parts, I've found the diffuse flat light works pretty well. My shop is painted white, and I use a studio flash pointing at the wall behind the camera.
The next step up is a ring flash on the camera, plus a white tent.
The next step is crossed polarizers, where the camera lens has a linear polarizer, and the lamps have a perpendicular polarizer. This eliminates all specular reflections, and makes shiney metal vanish. One usually detunes the setup so the metal will show just enough.
War story: Many years ago, on an Olympus Camera group, I noted that the pros photographing models all seemed to use Hasselblad cameras with big ring flashes, which flattened things, which didn't seem like a good idea a good idea with such models, and expressed mystification. The answer that came back was that the ringflash eliminated the bags under the eyes from to much partying, and too many controlled substances. Oh. Never mind.
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