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Once you have taken the leap into the professional realm, there are other decisions that will now need to me made. For example: what style of photography is going to showcase your work the best? Well, that will all depend on how you plan on using the photos. One style of photography does not always work for every need. In an earlier blog post I wrote about the multiple styles of photography I use for product photography. In this post, I will explore the various photography styles and their uses when the product to be presented is jewelry and how to decide what style or “look” will work best for you.

I have had many jewelry clients throughout the years and have approached them with a wide range of styles and techniques. I have come to find that there are three styles of jewelry photography that I keep returning to. I have been photographing artist Shari Both’s jewelry for about ten years. Over this course of time Shari has come to me with different needs for her photos. Considering her needs have called for each of these styles of photography I am happy to use her photos as examples of each of these styles.

Jewelry photography on a reflective black surface

This is a very classic and appealing style of jewelry photography that you will often see in high-end exhibition catalogs, magazines or other publications. This style is a bit more time-consuming during both the photography and the post-editing process, but definitely worth the investment. This is, in my opinion and in the opinion of many others including jurors and potential customers, one of best styles to showcase jewelry.

Jewelry photography with a pure white background

Photography on a pure white background is the standard for many submissions including Amazon and a countless number of jewelry catalogs around the world. This is the preferred style for websites with pure white themes. It is a very clean look but you have to be careful of a few things. You can tell quite easily when a piece of jewelry has been cut out and the background has been digitally removed. This can make your jewelry appear to be floating in space and not anchored by any shadows. One other important aspect of the pure white background is that it is in fact, pure white. If it is not, when the file is placed on to a pure white background the outside edges of you’re uploaded file we’ll have a distinct off-white or gray edge. This is definitely something  you don’t
want.

Jewelry photography with a creative approach

This style of photography is definitely open to interpretation. Here is where some of the best artistry in photography can be used. Truly the sky is the limit here, but you don’t want that sky to take away from the jewelry you are presenting. It can be easy to get carried away with props or other means to an interesting photograph. So keep the focus on the jewelry. Often jewelry designers may choose to use this style of photography on their homepage or advertising but choose to use a simpler style, such as the pure white background, for the rest of their work.

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If wood chips aren’t exactly what you have in mind for your work, I am sure that we can think outside the box and create some photos that can serve multiple purposes for marketing and sales. Think of it this way; there are the portfolio and catalog shots, which are at the heart of your portfolio, but having a few shots that stand alone can really make a difference in your marketing, and is never a bad thing to have on hand for whatever the use may be. Having these shots can really give a creative kick to your marketing materials! Ok, and they are really fun to do, too!

You can see more of their woodworking tools as well as more photos at carterandsontoolworks.com

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Marceil first came to me this past March to photograph her portfolio of fine woodcarvings. She was also interested in having me create a business card for her as well as a postcard in preparation for her inclusion in the upcoming Spotlight Show at the Northwest Woodworkers Gallery in Seattle’s Beltown neighborhood. Our artist portrait session at Woodland Park for press release and publication rounded out the services I provided for Marceil Though her new website is currently under construction, you will soon be able to view her work at marceildelacy.com.

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The evening of the opening at the Abmeyer + Wood Gallery came and went and was truly, a great experience. I am so used to my own personal connection with the art I photograph for my clients and the care that goes into each shot, but to be able to take part in the ritual of exhibition on the opening night was again, an honor. I would welcome the opportunity to shoot future openings for Katie, or any my wonderful artist clients. By the way; I did sneak a photo of myself and the artist standing next to one of her paintings.

Along with this blog post, I wanted to include Katie’s artist statement from her latest exhibition “Grounded Stories.”

“The subject of my work is my immediate surroundings, the plethora of images arising from my life in the heart of the city. The constant but ever-changing weave and movement of people, color, angle and aura has become an endless source of fascination and inspiration.

As my vision of all of it evolves and deepens, my translation of the city’s light and soul into the language of line and paint comes through.”

To see more of Katie Metz work, please visit her website.

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Throughout the 1980’s, my father commissioned a select handful artists to scrimshaw the history of Alaska on 32 full-length legal walrus ivory tusks. (don’t worry, no walruses were harmed in the making of this project). In the mid 90’s, my father opened the doors to the Corrington Museum of Alaskan History, developed to display and centered on the commissioned tusks.

I was very excited to learn about the book project featuring the museum, and was hired to fly to Skagway to shoot the tusks as well as a full spread of the museum and its exhibits. I packed all of my gear and headed north to begin shooting the day after the cruise ships pulled their anchors for the season. The first few days were spent shooting the museum as an architectural spread, making sure to get the full scope of the layout and exhibitions. The last few days of the shoot were dedicated to the tusks. Of course, this was smack dab in the middle of my domain: photographing beautiful works of art.

I was able to photograph all the tusks but one. A few years ago, one of the 32 tusks was stolen from the museum, and the book would not be complete without it. So with that, one of my challenges was to restore the missing tusk from a grainy, out if focus, partial photograph which cut off both ends of the tusk. Without going into a lengthy tutorial on the finer points of Photoshop, I will just say that I brought the tusk back to life in a way that would make Dr. Frankenstein proud. Aside from a dozen various sharpening and editing treatments, the missing pieces of the tusk were created from tusks I had photographed.

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Peggy came to my studio last year intending to have me photograph her paintings and perhaps help organize her many stories the paintings were illustrating. The paintings she brought to me were sweet and honest as were her stories. I showed Peggy some samples of work that I had done combining images with text and explained the options that we could explore. The first step would be to create a well-formatted, full color document that could be printed at any print shop. A print shop would also be able to bind the copies together. If Peggy wanted to stop there, she would at the very least have all of her work well organized and printed: something she could hold in her hand. This was a good place to start. If Peggy decided to take the project the next level, we could then pursue options for her work to be published as a book.

There was a time, not so long ago I might add, that getting a book published meant either doing what was necessary to find a publisher or dropping lots of money on a publishing house that would print your work, as long as you had the cash to back the publication. Back in 2002, I went the traditional route to find a publisher for the book Alaska’s Daughter: An Eskimo Memoir of the Early 20^th Century, by Elizabeth Pinson. After a 2-year process, the book was published in 2004. Though this made the author and myself thrilled and filled with success, 2 years is a really long time to wait.

Those publication options are still available of course, but now there is another path to publication: print on demand, otherwise known as self-publishing. After doing some research I found CreateSpace (now KDP or Kindle Direct Publishing), a subsidiary of Amazon, which made things fairly easy with regards to distribution and royalties to the writer. Amazon also made the search for her book on their site a breeze. Once someone orders a book, it is then created through KDP and shipped to the buyer through Amazon, who will then put Peggy’s royalties into her bank; pretty cool!

As a client, Peggy definitely falls into the “full service” category once again. In addition to the publication and design of Pj’s World, I wrote the blurb on the back cover and took her portrait for it as well. Peggy also asked me to create her postcards and business cards. The second book in the series is in the making. So I guess it is safe to say…to be continued.

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Lois Gay is an abstract artist working in fiber and mixed media and is a maker of connections. She grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area learning fiber crafts and developing a love of anything miniature. Over the years her work has bounced back and forth between fiber art and architectural model making. In her current fiber artwork, the two most prominent threads are spirituality and connections. Like a multi-strand braid, her many different interests interweave to create the path she has followed to her present ‘fiber-brained’ endeavors.

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