Dustin Dolby from Workphlo is great at creating simple, to-the-point photography tutorials that can really up your product photography game. And in his latest creation, he shows you how a cheap IKEA lampshade is actually a great, all-in-one diffuser solution when photographing reflective products—in his case, a watch.
The lamp shade in question comes from the $10 IKEA Melodi lamp, and what’s great about it is that it gives you 360° diffusion coverage for your off-camera speedlights, and a hole through which you can shoot. As Dolby puts it, “it’s much more all-encompassing” than using a single diffuser like he does at the beginning of the video.
Once he has his “diffuser” set up, Dolby goes on to play around with various lighting setups, adding fill, doing a little bit of reflecting, and then putting the final product together in Photoshop by compositing the lighting he likes best into a single, final image.
As with all of Dolby’s videos, he combines this step-by-step walkthrough in the studio with tips and tricks in Photoshop so you can follow along and understand how the final image came to be. Speaking of which, this is what he ends up with after a bit of experimentation and compositing:
Check out the full video up top, and if you’re into product photography, you can find more of Dolby’s helpful Workphlo tutorials in our archives or by subscribing to his YouTube channel.
(via Reddit)
