Product Photography Lighting - Avoid These Beginner Lighting Setup Mistakes!

In this video, we're going to take a look at the surprising evolution of drink photography for 2024. Using Broncolor scoro and Fuji GFX 100s, we'll explore some of the most popular techniques for photographing cans of drinks in a modern style.
Whether you're a beginner or a pro, this video is a great primer on how to photograph cans of drinks in a modern style. By the end, you'll have a repertoire of skills that you can use to capture the perfect can of your favorite drink!
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[@TinHouseStudioUK]

For top secret info, head over to here www.patreon.com/tinhouse

[@thewhiteroom2032]

Salute sir . Thank you

[@josephsharketti2173]

I know this type of content takes much more time/effort/edits, but this is exactly what I love to see!

[@TinHouseStudioUK]

Glad you enjoy it!

[@tomm7910]

Agreed! I’m subscribed now after seeing this.

[@PaulFoley]

Thanks for this well produced and explained video. I’m a retired pro from the diffused highlights era but I love the hard light look you have mastered. More of these, please. Your insight videos into the business of pro photography are still very useful but perhaps a 70-30 mix of ‘How to’ to ‘Insight’ might be a good ratio. All the best!

[@brad_in_yyc]

Love seeing your workflow Scott. Just brilliant. Simple and to the point, but done well.

[@ConnorRayArt]

Interesting. I do the opposite, I start with the silhouette of the object and its shape. When I’m pleased with the objects silhouette and the background light I start lighting the object.

[@TinHouseStudioUK]

I dont suppose it makes a difference in the end ? Although maybe it does..

[@justinparker1148]

LOVE hearing your thoughts as you work. Really hope you do more of this style of videos- it was excellent 👍

[@DavidFranklin-fu7st]

Quite interesting. Just ran into your site by pure chance. It brought back a lot of memories for me. I am a semi-retired photographer who had a long and varied career, shooting everything from Time and Newsweek magazines, tons of corporate people stuff, and, maybe most significantly, a heavy concentration on shooting cars for corporate, national advertising and catalog uses, in my own quite large studio and on location all over the U.S. The kinds of techniques you are demonstrating are great. But, just imagine a product that is 20 feet long, made of totally reflective glass and metal with some dull rubber thrown in for good measure. Massively complex stuff, especially in the film era with things like in-camera masking, 8x10 cameras, 40,000-50,000 watts of tungsten hot lights with giant banks and reflectors and multitudes of other grip gear. It was an incredibly demanding profession in which time became the most precious commodity, sometimes in a way that was daunting and maybe a little destructive of health and relationships, but was often a lot of fun as well. Now I work much, much less doing just a bit of work at my leisure, but hardly ever a car any longer. Keep up your videos; they probably help many aspiring shooters to understand how to create a picture, rather than just take one.

[@Steefanari]

Very interesting video and impressive work! One question though: Why wouldn't you center the can in your frame? You're doing all these micro adjustments but still the subject remains off to the right. Same for the platform it's standing on but I guess that's not in the final shot.

[@jasonmorrow5732]

*completely pitch black photo* Me: “damnit it screwed up” Scott: “perfection”

[@Jay-sr8ge]

Really hope this style of content gets traction because I love these videos!

[@TinHouseStudioUK]

just done some playing with thumbnails and titles and its doing better now

[@cl4ym4n]

Great lesson! Great explanation for every step and you can always see what changed and why. Honestly I don’t know why others take so long to explain anything. As for more topics: Maybe you could talk a little about tilt/shift rise/fall and what they do or what you could do with them.

[@TinHouseStudioUK]

Glad it was helpful!

[@jimpix8019]

Nice work Scott. Reminds me of the darkroom turned inside out… Dodging and burning when making the exposure through the enlarger. You’re burning with the lights and dodging with the flag and finger. I enjoyed it. May the Force be with you.🌀 Jim🌀 (-: :-)

[@DRGBTL23]

Putting so much effort to get an image of a can is ridiculous. A 3D modeler or a digital artist can photoshop for less money and time.

[@ohnoflicks]

The biggest mistake I see new shooters make is to spray down the can, then pop off every haphazardly placed light, then wonder why their shot sucks. You’ve broken down things perfectly here. It’s the way things SHOULD be done.

[@jeremytome]

Great to see the workflow to create the image

[@TinHouseStudioUK]

Thanks

[@AndreSjoberg]

Such a good video, no faffing about, just pure and simple process all the way through with the little details sprinkled in, love it :)

[@sammorganmoore]

get the arm a little higher and tilt down to the flag... then you wont be tall enough to poke your eye tenni ball or not.

[@jamesswift4]

Amazing to see this BTS style content. I’d be interested to see more of these types of videos - it’s inspiring!

[@christopherbgriffith]

Love it - this is so jam-packed with educational content it's bursting at the seams! Thank you for your generosity, Scott. This is wonderful.

[@ybab-j]

tiny tips, big tips…it’s very generous of you to share this with us.

[@terratorus]

this was great! super educational. i would pay for masterclasses like this!

[@semperfi-1918]

Wow.. all that work for 1 photo. Excellent end result.

[@andrefelixstudio2833]

Very nice that you took the time ou to show how you shoot a product. I am sure many people enjoyed it!

[@ShoutAtMeElmo]

yessir this was awesome, quick video but slow paced and great information, perfect for bite-sized learning. Thank you

[@TinHouseStudioUK]

Glad you liked it!

[@liveinaweorg]

Fascinating to see what is involved; thank you.

[@DragonM3D]

I love these behind the scenes product shoot videos. Just curious how you would handle the box the can is sitting on. Would you leave that in or replace it with another surface? Great work is always Scott

[@ceilimrobinson3096]

I too wonder this.. great work btw Scott love it

[@elle-xe9md]

It’s really refreshing to see a pro work, and explain the what’s and why’s. A really interesting and educational new series of videos. Really helps appreciate the work, and the work involved in making these vids too

[@conorfriel522]

Great seeing this workflow! Fantastic channel. Thanks Scott!

[@PhotoArtBrussels]

Thank you for the great video and showing how you create the images! I notice that your images roll into your Mac very slowly. I also have a Fuji 100S; a set of Tether Tools cables (10meter in total) and a modern Windows 11 PC + CaptureOne. That setup transfers images much, much faster. Maybe the load-time is not an important subject for you. For studio portrait / fashion photography the extra speed is very welcome, if not needed. Laptop has a 8 core fast desktop CPU, an nVidia RTX GPU, 64GB RAM and runs SSD's.

[@sparketech]

How many photos did you "can"? I almost got that X-ray (picture) vibe with that flash and those sounds when capturing.

[@colourberry]

Just looks like a wet can. I recommend freezing the can first (make a hole top rear so the freezing doesnt distort the can and liquid can escape) then when ready for the money shot swap out the can. It will look frosty naturally and not like a wet warm can. Also if you must spray shield the lens because that vapor can flow back.

[@robr3621]

You're images seem to be coming in pretty slow. I used GFX100 (original) and macbook pro with M chip and its much faster....

[@thomclhn4591]

this was brilliant. Textbook. Felt like I was in lecture. Thank you maestro!! Quick question, if I join patreon, am I able to ask you questions i.e. "how did you" or "how do I?" not saying I'll spam your inbox with 100 questions, just more random advice really. thank you!

[@sidestreetvideoproduction7278]

Great Video. I just got a FujiFilm 100S. What software are you tethered and running on the computer? I don't usually do tethered, but am interested. How do you have the Cambo mounted to the FujiFilm 100S? I've done commercial product work years ago with soft boxes. So interested and amazed in the new lighting trend. Thanks.

[@jpdj2715]

Great video, process, results. Impressive kit. Looking at the aspect ratio of your Scoro packs by broncolor, they must be 3200-E packs. That's a loud bang when you fire both at full power ;) to convert electrons to photons. While the video has some 24K views at the moment I write, I doubt that even a handful understands and appreciates these things. As you have spent time in video on your camera, these packs warrant a video of their own. Fifty years ago, I would shoot with a pack that had proportional modelling light and that in itself is maybe the most important feature that cannot be underestimated in value. To me, today, the follow-up question would be, how consistent the modelling light's colour temperature is at different levels. Because hybrid cameras, video, and constant light options. Imagine these packs could flash at movie FPS rate and sync to the camera. For flash, Bron had consistent colour temperature and very fast flash durations under control in their designs before 1980, IIRC. Over the past decades, these qualities seeped down into cheap kit for professional use and even consumer grade kit, but the proportional modelling light isn't even a theme anywhere. I had the impression that camera manufacturers and cheap Chinese flash manufacturers - one of them calls themselves "God Ox" in Chinese or Holy Cow - had figured out how to do it too, even before Profoto made an attempt at it. On these Scoro packs, the proportionality can be adjusted for a match with other packs/kit - wow. While cheap kit has no proportional modelling light or no modelling light at all, the question here is, how much power went into these shots or, could you do this with smaller or speedlights flashes? A quick calculation and my guess is 100 Joules (J, Joule=Watt.second=J=W.s=Ws - this is about energy consumption, and that Ws are a micro version of kWh, so they're not the plural of Watt (W) that is a unit of potential power). You need two on-camera Holy Cows for that W.s power but may need 3 if they waste a lot of electrical energy. The calculation - the Scoro pack burns through 3,200 W.s or J in a full power flash and is rated at f/90 for ISO 100 and 2m, giving a Guide number in meters of 180 (590 in feet). Shooting at f/16 with the lights at about 2m distance means you are 5 EV under full power and that means 100 in Joules or Watt.seconds. Speed and consistency paired with rugged robust reliability - has a price. And, to quote Oscar Wilde, some people know the price of everything but the value of nothing. If you want I can reference to a video in YT that needed 9,600 W.s

[@emmanuelmiranda8377]

Just stumbled upon this channel. Fantastic work here. Great breakdown and very informative. I was wondering which light was going off when taking the picture and the purpose of that light? 😅

[@Samson33FG]

Hey, I really like your videos...nice work! Just a quick question because I've been looking for a while for an adjustable lens hood. What is the one you're using? Looks like a good one....

[@TheOlandex]

Enjoyed this. I did a shoot for a local area micro brewery a while ago and shot about 10 different labels of that brand, so I really appreciate the painstaking detail of tiny adjustments to get just the right look. I also styled each label differently so that the client got some themed images along with all the standard plain background images that they could do web designs of their own with. Was a good job, and I'd like to do more of it. Your video kind of validated my approach to the shoot, which is great - thank you!

[@robertleeimages]

I was doing similar in natural light shooting flowers in the garden fiddling around like an old hen to get lighting right before giving them a spray to make them look like they were taken in morning dew and the wind would always start blowing just enough as i would be ready to push the remote shutter 😂

[@gregorybown]

HaHa, I think when I die, I'm going to c-stand hell😂 with extreme fiddling. Very entertaining and instructional. Great video!

[@AdamSills]

Really enjoyed seeing your work process. Thank you so much for this interesting and useful video

[@jimjimgl3]

Hard light is everywhere at the moment. I think it must have something to do with how small images on mobile devices appear and that extra punch makes them more readable smaller. I began (with film) when softer, more "daylight" look was everything. Now nearly all my clients ask for that hard light punch. I don't mind it and when it is done well, like you do, it is very attractive. I sometimes am hired to shoot at a Leo Burnett studio and they have 2 full-time photographers and at the end of the day all our work looks pretty much the same because clients want that hard light. Actually, the only time I ever shoot a Fuji GFX100s is when I am at the Leo Burnett studio and I fell in love with the camera. Jealous!

[@nikitabaryshnikov1739]

Nice video mate. Just out of curiosity - what were those beginners lighting setup mistakes lol ? 😅

[@miguelalves424]

Hello!! Great video, loved every bit of it, very well made and super helpful, just have one question: In this photos is there any difference to use the cambo or if it wasn’t mounted you would get the same results? Thank you!

[@coolforcats1]

Loved watching this. I shoot this style of work a lot and it's quite theraputic in way to watch others doing it too! :) Looking forward to the next one.

[@charlierodiles2102]

This was incredible, it's very interesting and educational hearing your thought process on the go. More of these types of videos would be great!!

[@danncorbit3623]

This sort of thing is dominantly more important than telling people what camera or lens to buy. Furthermore, the same techniques work with any and all camera equipment.

[@dandonovan1]

This was fantastic. Nice change from my people photography. Just curious about the spray. Was it water or was something mixed in with it?

[@mikehirak4311]

This is brilliant information.information that is needed and very much appreciated ….. believe me!

[@Sonybo100]

Ayyyy so happy you are uploading them, I caugh it live. Btw didn't you go live with another video the day before yesterday? I caught that you were live but there was nothing uploaded afterwards, was it like a premiere test video?

[@ryancooper3629]

Fantastic video, as always. I'm curious, and this may be a whole video topic in itself but in this video you mention specific lighting styles that have fallen off trends and ones that are on trend that you want to make sure you adhere to. My question is sort of two parts: 1. How do you stay ahead of these trends to ensure that your work is always in demand based on what art buyers want? 2. How do you balance adhering to the trends while also ensuring that you ensure that your work remains unique to your style and vision so that your brand as a photographer remains distinct and recognizable? What makes you look at a new trend and say: "This needs to be incorporated to my work" or conversely what makes you think: "Thats nice, but it clashes with my style in a negative way so I won't be incorporating it"

[@FriesyRider]

Super helpful to see, it's really a whole time consuming photo process with taking a bunch of shots rewarded with a nice result and not only Photoshop

[@Dewabarasunderan]

Not really sure what the professional lighting was supposed to be. This is pretty much standard lighting.

[@janni4541]

Hey I'm curious when a client would choose to have their product photographed in comparison to having a 3D Artist do a render. Is it that traditional photography is more common for printed media and 3D for digital use or is it just by taste?

[@killpop8255]

Nice to watch but can't believe you didn't to a spritz test too. Seeing this I really need to look into tethered shooting. I only look at the camera back preview and zoom in there. I hardly ever put the camera card in to a PC and have a better look. I just do it all out of 'passion' rather than looking for £. But that may change with the cost of living.

[@Hawaiian_lightning]

Love this video! Very educational and thorough. Although I am not a professional product photographer of any kind, I would’ve liked to see the “C” in caffeine fully shown. Great video nonetheless!

[@giordiserafini_]

Awesome! Thank you for making these. Would definitely love to see you light a shoot with a clear drink bottle and deal with reflections. Thanks again!

[@giordiserafini_]

@TinHouseStudioUK now I see there’s one upcoming already, you 10 steps ahead of us haha 😂🙌🙌

[@rickjbradbury]

🤣 What did you hit with the jet setting on the spray bottle. Great video mate, tons of info in general and also if folk watch between the lines.

[@TinHouseStudioUK]

Everything

[@philipspector4875]

Amazing video, love watching your content mate. What focal length Mamiya did you use in this?

[@pwx8460]

Fabulous. Got a lot out of this seeing how you worked through the shoot. Really appreciate it. Now I need to go buy another C stand. 😅

[@JohnShyloski]

Really like seeing this kind of content. Just to see someone else’s approach to product shots and get a new idea or to reinforce something I already do. Thanks for all the great videos and business sense you bring to them!

[@jimzielinski946]

You mentioned how styles have changed. It would be interesting to see a whole video on style history in product photography.

[@JonnyBarrett]

Great video - really valuable content. Awesome channel, subbed

[@q3aki]

ok this is how I imagine learning stuff from a pro - not a youtube dork - love it! great job - one thing always gets me while doing those kind of shot, how do price them, to be fair for You as a creative and for the client

[@Sonybo100]

Also happy new gear! Hope you are having lots of new fun with it! Cheers from the Balkans

[@dazwhit]

Photograph a dark football helmet. I would be curious how you handle the reflection of the background due to the spherical shape.

[@big-smoke-rc]

Retoucher here: please don't touch the clarity slider. Please!!! Great video

[@MsLivetosmile]

Thank you so much for sharing these insightful videos, especially your thinking being lighting!

[@rickietatum4319]

that was an excellent video, watching the build up to what became the final shot was very interesting.

[@MrBobbydurston]

Nice video, you could do with some dots and fingers though instead of the flag over the can, maybe a single finger 👍

[@ceilimrobinson3096]

Really really enjoyed this scott amazing work always a pleasure

[@neeyal]

Love this, don't have any specific requests. All of it.

[@paco355]

Mia what lens? Sorry didn't catch that, love your pro advice videos!

[@samk2407]

I feel like clients should be required to watch this video before complaining about rates or time lol

[@osamaato921]

can you please tell the name of the software you use ? and if you can use it with any DSLR for example or it unique ? thank you , the first video in youtube that i can say it was helpfull

[@jameldecasseres8638]

Awesome sauce! Time to go practice. Thank you 🙏🏽!

[@marcinklawy2996]

Thank you very much. That was very entertaining and educational at the same time.

[@roudyf]

Thanks a lot Scott. Would love to see more of this, specially what that Cambo can do 😅

[@gbj6581]

Thank you, very helpful showing us the entire process in this way.

[@ssrrfff]

Why spend so much time getting the crop perfect in camera rather than fixing it in Photoshop

[@samuel_andreyev]

This is amazing

[@mainmain5303]

This is amazing work… want more and more and more and more of this

[@sidestreetvideoproduction7278]

I'm curious as to what cable you are using to tether the camera to the computer?

[@kaspera.daviesthegastromed9431]

Scott are the finger and flag from godox? If yes, are they worth it?

[@danwongphoto]

could you use a magic arm for the fingers and flags that need more precision?

[@WasionKey]

I love you

[@alpabopo]

Great video. Keep it up with these kind. Pretty awesome man.

[@charliecampbell3014]

I really enjoyed watching your wotkflow

[@BehindThePhoto]

Fantastic Video. Thank you for sharing. 🙏💯📸

[@andrewjacksonmusic]

This is a great video. Makes me want to get some c stands instead of using microphone stands 😂😂

[@MarkDuffyPhotography]

Oh the standing desk option is so good. I have a set of heavy duty saw horses because I can pack them away out of my way when not using them not that you have that issue in your studio but I really like the standing desk idea. Now to continue watching lol, commenting as I'm watching

[@dickroot1937]

I enjoyed this video format, was quite fun.

[@TinHouseStudioUK]

Yay, thank you!

[@ianbartlett4083]

Man. This is absolutely fascinating!!!

[@caryrules]

Yeeeesssss! Thank you for sharing this type of content.

[@TeleNikon]

Beautiful work and process.

[@henril.2158]

How much do you get paid to do something like that.

[@SemiSendy]

I'm really impressed with the "on site learning" feel of this. More real time, step by step, observing and digesting. Top notch!

[@koreanwonders]

Fantastic video and bits of knowledge!

[@hzubovi1]

Thanks for this detail breakdown

[@KenOja]

Nice! Is that pure water or some kind of mixture?

[@Stwo]

I was thinking the same thing. Why would water be lethal on concrete? Must be something with an oil base, or some amount of oil/glyecerin in it.

[@TinHouseStudioUK]

its a mix of glycerines and water