Warner Schmidt Photography

In an effort to expand my portfolio and service offerings, I took to the task of photographing jewelry.

As a guy, I have no jewelry beyond my ring and a small chain I wear pretty frequently.

Much to my surprise, photographing jewelry is significantly more diffuclt than it might seem. Lighting is of paramount importance and reflections are a nightmare if uncontrolled. I’ll admit that I thought it would be much easier, but as I began using different techniques within my lightbox, the difficulty of accurately capturing each piece of jewelry became increasingly evident. In composing the photos, I used anywhere from 1-5 lighting elements, a handful of reflectors, fabric, tape, paper, and more. One of the most nerve-racking elements was getting the jewelry to stop swaying when hanging in the lightbox. Using what little patience I have, I steadied each item and photographed them.

A special thanks goes out to my mother and girlfriend for providing the jewelry.

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To fill out the set of accessories my girlfriend purchased, I purchased a low-level tripod and another filter set. I’m spoiled, aren’t I?

I purchased an UltraPod. I was a bit skeptical in purchasing this particular tripod, but the reviews were undeniably positive and the price was right. Although small, this tripod has absolutely no problem supporting my camera even with a bracket, flash unit, and a 70-300mm lens. The ball joint allows a wide variety of movement and I’m sure the velcro strap will come in handy.

I also purchased a CPL, FLD, and UV filter set. Admittedly, the FLD lens won’t be too useful considering the camera already handles white balance extremely well. The UV filter will be good for protecting my most-used lens. It is the CPL filter that I am most intrigued with. Working at 90 degrees from the light source, the filter is polarized, allowing me to reduce glare unwanted reflections.

My wonderful girlfriend ordered a few photography toys I had on my Amazon wishlist. They’ve arrived and I’ve been playing with them ever since.

I now have a set of diopter filters, a special lens adapter, and a nice rubber hood for one of my lenses. The diopter filters allow me to focus objects much closer to the lens. In addition, I have a special adapter which can change the focal length or allow me to use two lenses at once. The lens hood provides both protection to the end of my lens and increased ability to block unwanted light sources.

All of the accesories are very nice…but the adapter and diopter filters do take some getting used to. With a diopter filter on my 70-300mm lens, I can focus objects just inches from the lens. While this is an incredible perspective for macro photography, the focal length must be accurate to the millimeter (if not even finer than that). The difference between focused and unfocused areas of an image is astonishing and dramatic. In many cases, the unfocused areas are so blurry that they are indistinguishable; an effect that allows me to bring out singular details.

In using these accessories, I’ve found that having a low level tripod is increasingly important. Hopefully I’ll find something on Amazon!