Doll Photography Part III- How To Take Quality Pictures of Dolls

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Doll Photography--Part III

This is Part III in this series. Part I discussed selection of basic equipment to get your doll photos on the Internet--cameras and scanners. Part II discussed options for getting close-up focus of your smaller dolls, doll marks and doll details from your camera. This installment gives some photographic tips and tricks for getting quality pictures of your dolls.

Lighting

Proper lighting of your doll will be the most important thing you can do to get an attractive, detailed photo of your doll. You have two options--natural light, and artificial light (usually from a camera flash).

Indoor

The interior of most houses will NOT have enough natural light to give you a good doll photo. Even if the light is bright enough, the "color balance" of a photo (especially one taken with with 35mm film) can be off--yellowish with a regular light bulb, or greenish with a fluorescent bulb. Many digital cameras will compensate for this through "white balance" adjustments, the quality of which will vary from camera to camera. You can also adjust the "white balance" in most photo editing software suites. Nevertheless, for sharp and well-lighted indoor photography, you will need a camera flash. You need to check the distance range for your camera flash--just like your camera has a focus range for sharpness, it also has a distance range outside of which the flash will not give the proper amount of light (usually washed out for a small doll--too MUCH light, too close). If your camera flash operates for close-up work, and your flash is removable, you should consider getting an attachment which would allow your flash to operate OFF the camera, since lighting to the side of an object, and not straight in the front, is always more appealing (if you put the lighting off to the side, the lighting is not flat, and it will create proper, flattering shadows on your doll). Digital cameras generally do NOT have removable flashes (except for full SLR ones and some high-end cameras, such as my new Coolpix 8800); 35mm SLR cameras DO. For extensive details on flash photography, check out Kodak's online flash photography course. Another option for indoor doll photography, especially if you are planning on extensive studio photography for a web site or eBay, would be standing photo lights. These can run quite hot and can be difficult to adjust to, but if you have a spot for a permanent set up and you are vigilant to turn the lights on and off between shots (or you buy sync cords to synch them to your camera) then it might be an option worth looking into.

Outdoor

Taking pictures outdoors, in natural light, is a good option if you do not have proper flash lighting. Outdoors, set up your doll on the proper background with a non-distracting background set behind it (see below). Try to set up the place where you are taking pictures in strong but indirect sunlight (direct sunlight will make the contrast in your pictures harsh); light shade is best. For truly professional results, use white reflective sheets (available at any good photo store) OR even plain white cardboard to the side of the doll, to increase natural light (and improve shadows!) on the doll, and then, take your picture! You should get soft, flattering light by using this method.

Backgrounds

Be very careful when choosing your background for a doll photo. Even slight textures and slightly bright colors can overwhelm the doll, or distract from its beauty. I prefer simple one-color backgrounds, such as you see in the picture of the dolls on this page. Backgrounds don't have to be completely neutral--for instance, a hot pink background might be appropriate for vintage Mod era Barbie doll. To avoid shadows on backgrounds, don't have the doll too close to the background, and practice different positions for the flash. If you have distracting bacgrounds (other dolls at the edge of the photo, a tree, the distant form of a piece of furniture) and no paper or other flat bacground, move your doll from the clutter as far as possible and use a low f-stop to blur your background. And, be careful when playing w/ith textured backgrounds--backgrounds that seem to be simple can overwhelm dolls with texture alone. Once, I used what I thought was lovely, simple pink fabric as a background for some tiny dolls. BIG mistake; when I got the photos back from the developer, I was shocked to see how the pink color AND the slight texture in the fabric overwhelmed the small dolls!. You can purchase plain or colored one-color cardboard or poster board at an art store, and use that for backgrounds/foregrounds.

Composition/Focus

Finally, a few words on composition and focus. Keep your composition simple, with few, extraneous accessories (unless you are creating a scenes, such as a doll tea party). Look at your composition critically, and take out anything distracting or extraneous. BUSY doll photos are confusing and not very attractive (just like an overstuffed doll cabinet can be--the viewer doesn't know what to look at first!).

As for focus, close-up photos have very shallow depths of field, which means that often part of your doll face will be in focus, but the entire doll WON'T be. So, carefully choose which part of your doll or doll accessory you focus on, and if you are using a 35mm camera, use a small aperture for better depth of field (f8, f15, f22, etc.).. For dolls, the eyes are essential to be in focus, and you should always focus there. For a wonderful online course in the basics of photography, visit Kodak's Guide To Better Pictures. A good source for helping you select the digital camera you need is ww.dcresource.com.

Part IV will discuss software options for making dissemination of your pictures easier (online, via e-mail, and for auctions such as eBay), and for improving your pictures.

Part I of the Doll Photography Series (cameras and scanners)

Part II of the Doll Photography Series (close-ups)

Part III of the Doll Photography Series (Tips and Tricks for Quality Doll Photos)

Part IV of the Doll Photography Series (software for photo editing)

Do you have questions on photographing dolls? Ask me in the Doll Forum!

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