How to Create a Product Photography Lighting Setup on a Small Budget

Lighting  •  Photography Tips  •  Product Photography

Needless to say, studio lighting can be very expensive. Budding product photographers often find it beyond their means to afford the kind of professional lighting setup that’s necessary for producing great images. But what if you could get a professional quality setup for under 50 bucks? DSLR Video Shooter shares this amazing tip:

For the lighting setup, you can find a softbox for around 20 dollars. For those who hate working with softboxes, here’s the deal.

Neewer 24″ x 24″ Softbox

This particular softbox, a Neewer 24″ x 24″, is a foldable style that’s easy to store. It comes with an outer diffuser and Velcro that runs around the edge for easy attachment.

The softbox has an E27 socket, so you can plug a light bulb into it.

DSLR Video shooter uses a 40 watt LED corncob bulb, which costs around 20 dollars. The light is emitted from all around, which helps to get a good bounce and an even softer light.

To set up the light, you need a few plastic boxes or something equivalent that you already have around your home or office. Set up the plastic boxes on a tabletop, as demonstrated in the image and place the softbox on them. You can add or remove more plastic boxes depending on the size of the product being photographed.

The idea is to bring the light as close to the product as possible. The closer the light is to the subject the softer the quality. The external diffuser creates a soft diffused light that drops straight down on the product.

You can further modify this basic setup by removing one of the boxes from one side and tilting the light to produce more of an angle.

Or, you can remove all the boxes from one side and support the diffuser with boxes on side to create a side lighting effect.

To fill in shadows on the other side you can use foam core or a piece of paper, and you have an excellent setup to produce great stills and videos.

You can also put the light behind the product and experiment with backlighting.

It’s a simple, yet effective—and extremely cheap—solution for product photography lighting.