Okay pretty good start really. Your photo shows that you can be pretty technical with light and know how to use it, except you just need to know how to PLACE it if it makes any sense. I'll break it down for you as best as I can and give you some tips.
Before anything else, get a good base image. Im talking about semi neutral lighting and sharp. Don't get too crazy this should take about 10-15 minutes. You will then tweak as you shoot before you do the following things.
1. Angle.
You are pretty much shooting straight on with the focus being dead center of the bottle. You have to give the product some human qualities and perception is one of them. An easy way to give your item more presence is shooting from a heroic angle. Think of a child looking up at it's father. This works on most product shots but it'll pretty much apply to 99% of all SINGLE product shots. A good key is while camera is mounted on tripod, lower until you cannot see TOP OF PRODUCT and slightly angle/pan up using the head of tripod.. This may very well be less then a centimeter of movement. This also gives your image a sense of dominance and power, the lower and higher up you pan the more of a looking-up-at-a-building feel you get. Play with it.
2. Space.
In a strictly white background image like yours a lot of white is fine except in this case it's a tad too much. Only 25% of your frame actually had digital information the rest is nothing. Use AS MUCH frame as possible on solid backgrounds and IF and when lighting the background with a different color, shoot the background FIRST before you start on the product. It'll save you tons of headaches trying to figure out where all the stray light is coming from hitting your product by accident.
3. Condensation.
I have spent countless fucking hours apply water droplets to products ONE BY FUCKING ONE. It is very fucking hard and annoying but necessary on beverage drinks. A trick is using three types of water bottles so you don't have to do it one by one. One FINE mist like from a can of hair spray-type bottles... I believe they are called humidifier sprays? Avon sells them for like 3-4 dollars and it's used to cool you off. They are awesome for water drops as you can keep spraying GENTLE coats until you reach a desired condensation consistency. ALSO Rain-X your product first so the water BEADS UP on the surface instead of just splattering out. At this point if you wanna-redo the condensation you don't even have to wipe it off... you can just blow it off with compressed air. Having a squirt bottle for large drops will help if you wanna be quick. Hyperdermic doctor needle thing if you wanna be critical.
4. The top of the cap.
It's pretty much the ugliest thing on any product. It's annoying cause you can't really do anything about it. From your photo the cap is pretty flat because it is a MATTE white. Matte objects usually suck the light out of shit so usually what I would do is after I shoot the bottle/product I'd shoot the cap separately using the same set with all the lights set up half a stop higher. Then I'd just paste the cap together in photoshop. It's just much fucking easier this way.
5. Where the ice meets the bottle.
There is absolutely nothing connecting the bottle to the ice. Where the brown fades through the bottle into the ice is about the only thing but you need to light the ice also. This is tricky because ice melts and you have to work fast. A can of compressed hair held upside down that shoots out little farts of nitrogen will add some frost to a melty ice cube. Lighting the ice is very important and the way to light is actually not with white light but with BLACK. When a black object is held near it'll pick up some reflections and add dimension to the infinitely textured ice cubes. You'll probrally have to post this in photoshop with the rest of the bottle too.
6. The actual liquid.
Here's a tip for shooting things like soda. Don't use soda. Use food coloring. As you probrally may have realized the coke is dark as fuck and it's hard to get light to go through the bottle without blowing out all the highlights of the image. It's not your fault because it's basically fucking impossible... I know this from experience. Anyway get a set of food coloring and play with it until you get the right consistency. When you mix the food coloring and you think you have a pretty good "brown" you need to make it a bit darker. I have no idea maybe it's the actual sugar in the coke liquid that stops light through but just brown food coloring and water will make a nice dark amber color for your coca cola liquid.
7. Fill the bottle closer to the top with liquid.
That is a large gap from the cap that is actually just deadspace. You're gonna have to shoot the cap closed, then open the bottle and pour in more liquid to make less of a distance then re-shoot. The fact that I can see two horizon lines on the surface of the liquid makes it too cluttered also.
8. Logo
You did not light the logo and it's off center. The rule of thirds do not apply here. Geometry is key and straight lines are pleasing to the eye. Things like straightness of the bottle, where it's placed on the frame and horizon are key to a good image. Your images could actually pretty much suck but if all the technicalities are together then at least it won't be messy to look at. Make sure logo is straight!! If it's the product you are selling then light the logo with a nice gradient. This is SUPER important so you'd best to shoot it last when you can focus all of your attention on it and then paste it on photoshop.
So basically what I'm saying is your shot is pretty good for an "all-in-one" shot but most good shots are put together in post. You have to shoot the right elements and plug them into photoshop. Don't expect to get it all at once because no one shoots like that anymore... it's a waste of time and energy and you need to be very quick with this kind of shit. I hope I that helped, keep at it and post more stuff if you could.
Sorry for any grammatical errors Im rushing out the door for Christmas dinner.
Originally Posted by drew_amato
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