Product photography requires a special talent above and beyond photographic skills. It takes being part artist, designer and marketer to be able to stage products to reveal their best features and to appeal to the right audience. Product photography requires some real-world experience in marketing. I’m eternally grateful that life pushed me into marketing during my career or I may never have acquired the skills and knowledge that are so necessary to be a successful product / marketing photographer. I consider my marketing experience one of my most valuable photography skills. To have the flare for what will make a product look better requires an artist’s eye, otherwise you are just taking a photo of a boring old object. To make a consumer desire that product requires marketing skills.
When I was 16 or 17 years old, thanks to my Mom, I had the opportunity to meet with a renowned product photographer from Chicago. My Mom was doing physical exams for insurance companies in the home, and this photographer was on her list to visit. My Mom knew what he did for a living and asked him if I could come along on her visit to see his studio and talk to him. From the minute I walked into his house my eyes were the size of saucers. It was obvious he was successful at what he did. His house in the “Big Woods” was gorgeous and just the kind of place I would want to live in. But I quickly forgot what the rest of the house even looked like the minute he opened the door to his studio.
He had a studio built onto his house just for doing product photography. I was so lucky to spend the day with him, asking him questions, admiring his equipment and set up, getting some pointers, and dreaming of the day I could do the same thing he was. I was in total awe and envy. From that day on, my life’s ambition was to be just like him. I never forgot that opportunity to see how a professional product photographer operated, and I’ve always kept it in the back of my mind that my goal was to emulate him. To this day, I am eternally grateful to my Mother for even realizing how much I loved photography and that the best gift she could ever have given me was that day.
As soon as financially possible, I started to purchase studio equipment – which is pretty expensive in itself. A place to set up all of that equipment separate from the rest of my house would be a lifelong challenge. I used spare bedrooms mostly but never did achieve a studio built specifically for photography, as a building separate from the rest of the home and its own photographer’s world. That is still my goal, however, I have been moving too much and have not found my ideal location to build a permanent studio like he did. I have also found that spare bedrooms work just fine. His studio was extremely impressive, but as the years went on, I realized it was a bit too extravagant to be necessary. Oh sure. That type of studio and career setup is every photog’s dream, but he existed during the days of the big-name Chicago ad agencies like Leo Burnett and Ogilvy. Those days are now long gone and so is he, and the need for such a large private studio is unnecessary in today’s digital world. Not that I still wouldn’t love one, but the extra money to build it has always gone somewhere else for me.