Seiko 7A38 - by the numbers

Those of you who have tried, or already regularly photograph their watches will have realized it is something of a 'Black Art'. 

It's all to do with lighting - be it natural light (which I prefer) or artificial - flash or flood. 

Today a work colleague emailed me this: FOLDIO - The 1st foldable studio for Smartphone

I'm not plugging it - just passing on the suggestion.

Up until very recently I hadn't bothered with any kind of light box myself - permanent or portable.

Instead I just set up something on an ad-hoc basis, using sheets of white paper - often as not held together with paperclips.

Then I came across these 'Really Useful Boxes' http://www.reallyusefulproducts.co.uk/uk/html/onlineshop/fullrange_rub.php

I got the idea because they're moulded in translucent plastic. I bought the 9L (A4) size on eBay - and have partly lined it with paper.

Limited success so far, but the good thing about having a portable studio (with a carrying handle) is that you can set the watch up at your leisure and then move it around the house, or even take the complete box outside to get the perfect lighting for the shot.

This was my first experiment. I must admit I ran out of patience in the end (waiting for the perfect natural light on a cloudy day). 

Apart from the fact it was A4-sized - meaning it would be easier to line using standard A3 / A4 paper sizes ....

The reason I chose the 9L size 'Really Useful Box', was because I could use it in 'Portrait' mode for a single watch (as I did above) ....

Or in 'Landscape' format when photgraphing 2 or 3 watches side-by-side, as in this photo I did years ago, without the benefit of a box:

The thing to remember when lining your box is not to have any sharp creases in the paper. This was one of my first 'trial shots' in the very carefully paper-lined 'Really Useful' box, when I was setting up the Yema Spationaute III for the Aragatz 25th Anniversary photo: 

The clearly visible not quite horizontal contrasting line is the joint between my lining papers in the back and bottom of the box.

If you watch the Foldio demo video, you'll see their removable background sheet gently curves from the back of the box to the front.

Actually the Foldio is a pretty good idea... I built some time ago my own light box, out of a carton box and some blank bed sheets. Unfortunately, the cats decided to use it as their own playground, one night I forgot to remove it from the table... you can imagine what 3 playful cats do to a simple carton box, don't you?

I was always wanting to rebuild it, but never got down to it.