You have a ton of options for artificial lighting these days, more than ever before. There are the very expensive pro, high end lights for $1000’s of dollars, all the way down to a $20 softbox kit that’s not worth the cardboard box it’s shipped in. So how do you know what to get?
The other confusing thing is that different countries have now outlawed some of our options. They try to do their part with our environment, and companies come up with ways of saving energy, of course this will affect our choices in artificial light for photography.
This is important: If you are photographing a PRODUCT and struggling with getting accurate color with your artificial lights, you are having a white balance issue! Most likely you are using one of the cheaper versions of an LED light that has a low CRI. Please see my section below about that.
PLEASE NOTE: You do need to have an understanding of white balance with artificial lights. See this posts for information on white balance and color temperature and see this post about camera white balance settings.
Some of these links are my affiliate links. Should you purchase any of these items, I will make a few pennies at no cost to you. Clicking on the images will take you to the sales page for that product. If you notice a product is not available, please leave me a comment to update the post. I update this post about 10 times a year, but even then product availability changes all the time.
Several of the lights I am discussing are bulbs that you would normally use with a softbox, like this to the left, or in a light housing with a reflector. The softbox diffuses the light source – sometimes not enough, and you need to diffuse further by adding diffusion gels to it, but you get the idea. This kit comes with one softbox, one stand and and LED bulb. It’s a great price around $50 – but keep in mind it’s a cheap one so no idea how long this will last.
This bulb included is not a high CRI bulb (see below what that means) but you can easily switch it out for one that is. I talk about one similar to it in other posts.
This kit uses incandescent light bulbs – not flashes. The bulbs simply screw into the light socket and each light has to be plugged in separately.
I’m going to discuss all the options you have for artificial light bulbs, tell you my favorites, and some pros and cons of each one. There are a ton of options for each kind so if you do see other options, feel free to leave a comment to ask me about it.
We’ll be talking about these lights above. Please note that the two lights on the left have the diffusion panel removed from the softbox. You would not use the softbox in that manor, just wanted to show you the bulbs inside.
Table of Contents
1. High Wattage Tungsten Photo Globes
During the days of film, tungsten bulbs were extremely popular. Though they are still heavily used in the movie industry now, photography in countries outside the US is moving away from the tungsten photo incandescent light bulbs, because they are an energy waster.
Many countries have banned these tungsten incandescent light bulbs altogether. In the US, the specialty photo globes (pictured here) are still allowed, and still popular. They are very bright bulbs that are 250 watts, 300 watts, 500 watts, 650 watts, 1000 watts, all the way up to 24,000 watts – no joke. Oh yeah, that bulb, the 24,000 watt bulb, that’s about $4000.
I personally still like using my tungsten lights when I can.
They have a white balance of 3200-3400 Kelvin.
Please note: I am specifically speaking about photo globes here made for photography – not the common 60watt household bulb. Photo globes are bigger but the fitting is still the same.
Pros Of Tungsten Incandescent Light Bulbs:
- The bulb pictured above made for still photography – 300 – 500 watts are very inexpensive, $3-$6.
- Incandescent photo light bulbs have a very clean light, meaning there is no green tint in the light. I love tungsten light. It’s a very pretty light.
- Easy to purchase in the US.
- The photo bulbs are much brighter than the LED’s (with the same fitting A19) and CFL’s, so you only need one bulb in your softbox to get 500 watts compared to 4 or 5 LED’s, or CFL’s to get the same brightness. This statement seems to be causing some confusion for some readers so I want to make sure I’m being clear here. I am NOT comparing a house hold tungsten bulb that is only 60 watts. I am comparing the bigger photography bulbs pictured above to LED’s with the same household fitting.
- Tungsten is a very clean light, rarely will the Color Rendering Index (see below) be a problem with your white balance.
Cons Of Incandescent Light Bulbs:
- They are also called Hot Lights, because they are incredibly hot when used due to the high wattage.
- You must use them in a soft box that can handle these bulbs. Do not use them in a homemade box made out of foam core, and tissue paper – it will catch on fire!
- You also can’t use theses in the cheap softboxes you see on Amazon that are made for LED lights – they will also catch on fire.
- The amount of energy they use VS the amount of light they emit is extremely inefficient.
- They do not last very long at all. In fact, some bulbs say they last a total of 50-60 hours – but that is a bunch of malarkey. It’s much less.
- The higher wattage bulbs are very expensive – a 1000w bulb can be $30-$50, and barely last 20 hours.
- Several countries have outlawed these bulbs because of how inefficient they are, including the specialty photo bulbs.
- They are very delicate, and the filaments can get damaged easily in shipping.
- These lights have a WB from 3000-3400 so you can’t mix them with daylight, unless you gel them.
- You can not touch the high wattage bulbs with bare hands at all because the oil from your hand can actually make some bulbs explode.
2. CFL – Compact Fluorescent Lights (I hate these)
CFL’s are fairly new to the scene in our photo world because of the ban on incandescent lights several years ago. There are all kinds of CFL’s, with all kinds of prices, and I’ve done a lot of research on this. I have several issues with these lights that I will share in the “Cons” section below.
You have to do your research with these lights, and you CANNOT buy the cheapest ones you find. This light shown to the left is made by Westcott and is one of the good ones.
What Is The CRI Rating?
There is a very important rating for lighting. It’s called CRI – Color Rendering Index. To put it simply, CRI tells you how clean your light is. How accurately that light source is at rendering all the colors. The range goes from 0 – 100. This bulb above has a CRI of 91, which is great for a CFL, but not the best. Do not use lights with a CRI less than 90.
Here’s what that all means. Any light source has two different values to consider, the color temperature, and the tint. These two measurements make our white balance. The color temperature is measured in Kelvin on a scale, and that scale represents the color of light that goes from yellow/orange to blue. That scale goes from 1000k to 10,000k in most cameras, but we commonly use lights that go from 2700k – 6500k.
The tint however, is a value that goes from magenta to green with the color of our light. THIS IS EXTREMELY IMPORTANT. Without getting too technical here – the CRI basically tells us how green a light will be.
The light all around you has many different colors. It takes time to be able to see these nuances in your images.
Cheap CFL AND LED Bulbs Are Green In Color
So, the cheap CFL bulbs have a low CRI, so low that the manufacturer won’t even tell you what it is. When you read the light coming from their bulb with a color meter, then you can see how much green the bulb is adding to the light that it is emitting.
This is obviously a huge problem because a company that is using marketing jargon, calling their bulb a “full spectrum” bulb, would be implying that their bulb renders colors well, but it actually has a low CRI, like 80 for example, and the light has a huge green tint to it. This green tint makes it very difficult to color correct, and should never be called a “full spectrum”, or “pure white” bulb.
These bulbs come in a variety of color temperature options ranging from 3000K up to 6500K.
Here is an example of a cheap CFL that is totally bullsh!tting what they say about it. Do not buy these cheap LimoStudio bulbs. It’s saying it’s a daylight bulb with “Full Spectrum”, then it says in the details that it is “Daylight Balanced Pure White”. This is WRONG. Totally false advertising.
Yes, it might have a WB of 6500, but with a tint of 29 points green (according to my light color meter). I’m sorry, but that is not “pure white light”. 29 points green is a HUGE problem!!! I have two of these, as they came with the cheap crappy softbox I tested.
The entire point of using a daylight bulb is that you can mix it with real daylight if you need to. If the damn thing is green, guess what?? You can’t mix it with daylight because daylight is clean light and will never be green. It just pisses me off all this false advertising.
Ok, technically you CAN mix it with daylight, ONLY if you put magenta color correction gels on the light, and in order for you to know how many gels it needs, you need to have an expensive color meter like this.
I go on Amazon and I ask these import companies what their CRI is on their bulbs, and they NEVER answer my questions because they don’t want anyone to know how bad they are, or they just don’t know. I’ve also been flat out lied to about the CRI, got the light, tested it and sure enough the CRI was not near the promised 95+.
FOR ANYONE PHOTOGRAPHING FABRICS, GARMENTS, SOFT GOODS, CERAMICS, ARTWORK WITH PAINT, PIGMENT OR DYES: The CRI will be your most important specification with any light you are using. You will NOT be able to get accurate colors on your fabrics if you are using a cheap CFL or a cheap LED that has low CRI’s.
To get further technical about this – for accurate product photography you want a light that has a good CRI R9 (red color). Click here to read more about this.
CFL Lights Are Toxic
There’s another huge issue I have with these lights. All CFL’s contain mercury – yep mercury! You know, that extremely toxic heavy metal that can do all sorts of damage to your body. If you break a CFL bulb, you just ingested some airborne mercury powder. Oh they tell you that it’s no big deal because it’s a small amount.
That’s fine if you have never come across mercury in your entire life, ever. But I’m sorry, that’s just not the case. We have mercury in our water, the air (if you’re in a big city), in our tuna fish, the list goes on. So this adds up over time. I know this because I had mercury poisoning a few years ago. It’s not a good time. Enough said.
Pros Of CFL Bulbs (Not Much)
- They last a long time – seriously, I was told by Westcott (you can call them and ask any questions btw) that their CFL bulbs last 8,000 hours. So you could, in theory leave the light on all year long, every day.
- They do not get hot. You’ve got plenty of other options though that also don’t get hot.
Cons Of CFL Bulbs
- They contain mercury, and breaking them is a major hazmat clean up situation.
- Some countries have outlawed putting CFL bulbs in the trash. You have to dispose of it as if it is hazardous waste – because it actually is.
- The bulbs that have a high CRI are very expensive – $40 to $50 each.
- They do not emit a lot of light at all. You need several CFL’s to equal 1 incandescent photo light bulb of 500 watts.
- They are huge, so not all softboxes are appropriate for those bulbs. If you are not using a heavy duty light stand, your softbox can easily tip over if you are using four bulbs in one head.
- The cheap CFL’s have a major green tint to them, which really makes them useless.
- It seems the higher the wattage (brighter), the lower the CRI.
#3A LED Bulbs – A Great Option When Starting Out
We have several types of LED bulbs that I will talk about. This is just a few of the ones that work well for photography.
I’ve been testing some LED lights with the normal household fitting, also known as A19’s. I have to update this post all the time because these bulbs with the higher CRI quickly become unavailable.
As of this update, these bulbs to the left are available on Amazon for about $30 for the set and are made by Torchstar.
For my EU friends, I found this for you – the brand is Green And Co. They have an LED with a CRI of 90+. They don’t have a high wattage so you will have to get 4 of them to put in each softbox.
LED’s also do not get very hot when they are on, so that’s great. However, it is very hard finding higher wattage LED’s with a high CRI.
LED’s also come in a wide variety of color temperature options from about 3000 – 6500K.
So what I suggest to do is instead of using the CFL’s, get four of these LED bulbs with this 4 socket adapter (or equivalent), for your softbox. They can also be called a bulb splitter.
There are many brands that make these, so don’t get the cheapest one and try to find one that is UL listed, or approved in the US, or the equivalent in your country.
This one is made by the LimoStudio Korean import company that I am not a fan of, however this one product IS UL approved – or so they say. I’ve been using them, and they seem to be fine. Just know, I never leave lights plugged in when I’m not in the room, just for safety.
Now there are a few LED high CRI lights that are like a flood light, meaning they are very directional so I do not recommend those for the softboxes as they would require a ton of diffusion material so I’m not mentioning those here.
The LED below is the Smith-Victor 45 watt High CRI bulb for photography. This can be a great option. It has higher wattage and has a higher CRI. It is however $40. Westcott and Savage are also brands that make bulbs just like these. The bulbs are much brighter than the traditional household LED bulbs above, hence the price increase.
Pros of LED Bulbs
- Very affordable compared to high CRI CFL’s – Six LED’s are under $50 – Four CFL’s with high CRI start at $160.
- They last an extremely long time.
- They do not get hot when used.
- Very small, compact, and lightweight.
- The good brands do not contain mercury or lead.
- Very efficient, and use very little energy.
- You can get different white balance bulbs for your needs.
- You can get LED’s with a CRI as high as 95 for very clean light.
Cons of LED Bulbs
- Finding the high wattage bulbs with high CRI can be a challenge. At the time of this update, they are just starting to make some. 17 LED watts is equivalent to a tungsten 100w bulb. So you have to use at least 4 bulbs in your softbox to get near the output of 1 high wattage tungsten photo globe.
#3B LED Panel Lights – Bi-Color
It is shocking how many different panel lights you can find now. There are panel lights for $20 and panel lights for $1000’s of dollars. These LED lights have the same concerns as the bulbs listed above with CRI – Color Rendering Index.
If you are scanning this post, please look at light #2 above, and see my description of CRI. The cheap lights will be very green, and can’t be mixed with other lights. The lights with a higher CRI, are a lot more expensive.
Pictured above are the lights that I use for video. They are made by Dracast and have a CRI of 95 with only 2 points green, according to my color meter.
What I love about this light is that it is Bi-Color. This means it has a dial on the back that will let you change your color temperature from a warmer 2700k, up to daylight 6000k, and anything in between.
Close up of a bi-color LED panel light. You can see alternating rows of 3200K bulbs with 5500K bulbs
There are less expensive options that only have one color temperature and that can be anywhere from 3200K to 6500K.
When I am mixing this light with daylight or tungsten light, I use my color meter to measure the ambient light, then I dial that into the Dracast light to match. This light also has a dimmer dial for controlling brightness.
This light source is a pretty harsh light source, if you don’t diffuse the crap out of it. Even if you use the thin diffusion filter that comes with it, and if you want to use these for food photography, you’ll need to use several diffusion gels on this light to soften it, which is what I do.
Also, be warned of the cheaper Asian lights claiming they have a high CRI – they are completely lying about it. They know that most people buying these are not validating their color temperature, and CRI claims with a color meter, like I am. So if the thing is $20, it’s a green light.
#3C Next Generation High CRI LED Light, The COB LED.
I have this light. It’s a battery operated high output CLEAN led light. This light is also bi-color so I can dial in what ever white balance I need AND it has a CRI of 97.
This is the Genaray PortaBright Bi-Color Battery Powered LED Monolight. Monolights mean they are self contained for power. With this light you also have the option to plug it in if needed.
This is a great option and in the photo world, this is considered an inexpensive light. For those of you used to paying $20 for a light, will find this much more expensive BECAUSE it’s just a better light.
This is the close up of the Genaray LED light that I have. It’s completely different technology than your traditional “bulb”.
In the image above of the LED closeup you can see the bare LED chip mounted on the front. COB stands for Chip On Board.
Here is another COB LED light that is less expensive, it’s not as bright as the Genaray and doesn’t have all the bells and whistles as the light above. I am not familiar with this light but it looks like the reviews are good for it. For a little over $100, this is a great price.
It also claims that it has a hight CRI. I have not tested this one.
You will need to heavily diffuse these lights. These two lights have what’s called a Bowens Mount so any accessories that you buy for it will need that kind of mount to attached to it.
Pictured here you can see a reflector that has a Bowens mount on it. There are three notches that just clip into the light heads.
Here is a softbox that come with a Bowens mount speed ring so you can attach this to the light. This is made by a knock off brand called Neewer. I’ve had good luck and bad luck buying from this brand, just a heads up there.
With the heavier LED lights mentioned above, you must use a heavy duty light stand to keep the lights stable.
#4 Strobe Lights / Speedlites / Speedlights
Strobe lights are in a category all their own. I have to include them though, as they are artificial lights. They are always daylight balanced. For some reason, many bloggers are not calling these artificial lights. Any light that is not the sun, is artificial.
Also, to clarify. Canon calls their strobe lights, “speedlites”. Nikon calls their version “speedlights”. Let’s just confuse everyone, shall we? I grew up using Canon, so I always called them Speedlites.
There are several different kinds of strobes, and this will be its own blog post later on, but for now, here they are.
Speedlites, strobes, monolights, are always daylight balanced but can vary from 5000k to 6500K.
1. Speedlites, like the one above, are the smallest strobes. They take batteries, or can be plugged into a separate battery pack. They can be used off camera, and with devices called slaves to make them talk to other speedlites, and talk to the camera.
As you can see by how small the speedlite is, it’s limited in how much light it can put out when you start putting it into softboxes, and other light modifiers.
They typically have about 40 to 80 watts of power each. The really cheap ones only have about 35 watts of power. If you need to take pictures with a high f-stop like f16 in order to get everything in focus, these lights will be a problem for you.
This is a typical strobe bulb with a coiled glass tube and a glass outer shell.
2. Monolights
Monolights are also self contained (light and power is inside one head unit), and usually have to be plugged into the wall for power but there are quite a few now that have batteries.
There’s all kinds of extra accessories for these lights, like big battery packs, so you can take them anywhere. You need to use light modifiers for these as well, as the bare head strobe has very harsh, direct light.
These lights are great for smaller shots and are nice for doing restaurant shoots. Many new photographers like to start with these smaller lights to learn strobes, then move up to the bigger lights. More wattage = more cashola.
This is Adorama’s version of the Godox Xplor 600watt HHS. I have this light and really like it. I use it for all my editorial jobs now when we don’t have good natural light available, or when I’m shooting a portrait.
3. Strobe heads with strobe packs. For my commercial ad work, I mostly use large strobes. I use strobes to emulate daylight, and that’s the trick. It’s something I specialize in.
The image to the left (or above on mobile) is showing a Speedotron strobe pack that has 1200 watt-seconds of power. This is considered small in the world of pro studio strobes.
The packs have a capacitor inside them that holds the charge. When turned on, the packs will power up, hold the charge, then dump the charge through the strobe head when you take the picture.
There are many packs that have extremely high wattage. I use 4800ws packs all the time. If not used properly, the can be very dangerous.
Strobes are actually an explosion of light. We call it a pop when it flashes. You will hear a popping sound when it fires.
That explosion of light is a very harsh light so that will usually need to be diffused when shooting food.
In the image below you can see two large strobe heads, and they are plugged into those large black boxes. Those black boxes are the power packs. Each of those packs is rated at 4800 watts. I bounce light all the time off my studio walls, and you need a massive amount of power to do that, AND to have enough light to shoot an image at F/16, or 22, which is what most of the ad work requires, everything in focus.
I will also use strobe heads inside softboxes, and other modifiers.
So, you can see how the little monolights just don’t have enough power for what is needed when shooting images where everything needs to be in focus, in the kind of set up I am using above. All that for a little burrito!
With using professional studio strobes, you have hundreds of accessory options for strobe head attachments, light modifiers, all kinds of fun stuff to choose from. However, they all come with a steep price. The more power you need, the more money you have to spend to get that.
Using strobe lights is very different from any light source because you are working in stops of light. You measure the light coming out of the head in F-stops, so it’s confusing for folks when they are first learning this. And you have to sync your camera’s shutter speed to the strobes. You must also use a light meter (pictured left), to measure the light coming out of the strobe heads.
I will get more into the details of how to use strobes in another post.
So, there you have it, all our artificial lights that we have to choose from for photography.
Would you like a free guide with more details about artificial lighting? Click the image below:
For more information about food photography, please see my other Food Photography Ebooks.
Want more info about artificial lighting? Check out these posts?
Artificial Lighting For Food Photos Behind The Scenes
Easy Artificial Backlighting For Your Food Photos
Denise Keniston
This is an incredible blog post. I can’t imagine the amount of time, research, and accumlated knowledge it took to write it. With that said, I’m so happy I found your blog. I’ll be following you on social and pouring over your content. Thanks again!
Christina Peters
Hi Denise. Yes, this post will always be a work in progress as things are changing so fast. I’ve been adding to it over the years. Thanks for reading the Blog!
Adi
I am so happy I found your blog! I was hoping to get some advice on the best light source to get for food photography. I am a total novice and started a food blog two years ago.
Where I live, I don’t get much natural light and kitchen lights are super ugly. Based on your posts, I was planning on buying the Neewer soft box, a quad adapter like the one you mentioned above, and high CRI LED bulbs. I have my own table, and I think I will get some used fabric to create pretty backdrops by draping them over cardboard. I was also planning to make by own fill card using white cardboard. Is that all I need?
Also, I should mention that I do not own a camera and will be using my iphone while I save up for a more professional camera. Please let me know what you think of my plan. Any advice is appreciated!
Christina Peters
Hi Adi, I won’t be able to tell you all that need because this depends on the types of images that you want to create, but it sounds like you’ve got a great start.
Zsuzsi
Hi! Thank you for the informatiive post! I am a beginner, setting up my in-house photo studio. Planning to shoot home decor items, still lifes, flat-lays and later video content. If I want to recreate natural lighting with artificial lighting what do you recceomend to buy, a lighting kit? I have NikorD500. I would apprieciate all your help. I am really getting overwhelmed with all of the selections that is outhere on the internet.
Christina Peters
Hi Zsuzsi, the light isn’t want makes it look like natural light, it’s how you modify and use the light to make that happen. I emulate daylight with every type of light source on this post. So you need to determine your budget and what lights you feel comfortable using. It’s easiest to start with a constant light source, so the ones I suggested here on this page would be best.
Wyan
Hi Again:) here is the link to the update, it’s a Herculean effort every month to get everything made, photographed and uploads but I’m thankful we are able to sell online in these challenging times. Every month we get a little closer to my expectations but we still have a long way to go and I think proper lighting will be key. The white pieces are impossibly hard (some of the white piece images are left over from the previous month so the lighting is really bad but I ran out of time to reshoot) and with the current inadequate light systems and the colours of these pieces in particular aren’t as complimentary as I would like. The rest of the range the colours are pretty true though, as far as I can tell!
Thanks Christina!
https://www.claycanoe.com.au/
Christina Peters
Hi Wyan! Congrats! your website looks fantastic and your photography looks great. You should be very proud. Now I can see why you were struggling because a lot of your pieces have a neutral color so if your lights have a wacky wb, that would make it more obvious. You can also use your neutral ceramic piece as a color point in Lightroom with the wb eye dropper tool to fix your wb as a starting point. You probably figured that out by now.
James L. Castner
Thanks! i found them on both Amazon and at the Hyperikon website.
Christina Peters
Oh that’s great! I have several Hyperikon bulbs and they work very well.
James L. Castner
Thanks very much for your suggestions. Sorry to have strayed off the topic of Food Photography, but I saw Wyan’s post and that led to my own question on ceramics. By the way, I googled ‘High CRI Bulbs US’ and could only come up with LED bulbs that had a CRI of 80 (Philips). I did not go to the Hyperikon website but I don’t believe they are making the bulbs any more that had a CRI of 90, and that you could once buy on Amazon.
Christina Peters
Hi James, you need to google, “high CRI LED Bulbs”. You left out the “LED”. I find several when I google that. You will have to look through several pages of results to find the right ones. Also in this post I show high CRI LED bulbs with a direct link to buy them from Amazon. There is no reference to Hyperikon in this post now. Hyperikon DOES make and sell those high CRI bulbs, they just don’t sell them on Amazon. I regularly update this post because this info changes so fast. Please review the post again for the new information. I just googled this again and the first hit was a high CRI led bulb at Home depot.
Wyan
I see! I will def be investing in some better quality lighting! The strobe looks complicated and maybe a bit beyond me, am very much an amateur, I’ll have to look into them further. The LED panels are probably closer to the set up we have now with the boom and two side lights so maybe more achievable.. I take the images on a plinth in a small room so the back wall is also challenging to get uniformly lit.
I’ll pop the website up so you can have a look if you want, it won’t be up until Friday as I’m still photographing.. Best you don’t look at the white glazed pieces:)
Thanks for the intel, your very generous!
Christina Peters
Hi Wyan, yes, the strobes are definitely and advanced lighting option so your best alternative will be the high end LED panel lights or the high end LED monolights. Drop a link back here when your site is live. Would love to see it.
Wyan
We’re photographing our ceramics, I’ve been putting up with green/magenta colour casts for years and trying to edit them out but often you lose the actual colour of the piece and it takes hours to get the work don’e as I’m trying to have some continuity for our product shots. I ended up getting a professional photographer in to help try and diagnose the issue, after a full day of problem solving she looked at my 3 light kit and noticed that they were different colours!! So frustrating but good to know finally what was going on! I contacted the company that sold me the kit but they weren’t interested and seemed to have no idea about the different colour casts.. seriously!
I have spent hours and hours trying to find the equivalent LEDs here in Aus and they just don’t seem to exist, there are some expensive ones from the same online photography place but I just don’t trust them anymore. I think most people must use the ones similar to the dracast led panel you included but they cost a lot more here, the light you specified was over $500AUD plus shipping.. classic Australia:)
Anyway the LEDs I have just purchased are an improvement even though they are def 80CRI..
Thanks again:)
Christina Peters
Ahh, ceramics are very tricky. The pigments in your glazes will shift when using these kinds of lights. This post was written for food photography and that’s why I’ve been recommending these types of LED’s for those on a very small budget. Food does NOT react to cheap LED’s like products do. For product photography of soft goods, apparel, anything with paint, stains, pigments or dyes, I highly suggest to use the high CRI panel lights or strobes. And yes, they cost more BECAUSE they will give you a clean light with a neutral white balance. This is a must for product photography.
The only way to “see” the color of any of these lights is with a color meter. As you are not a photographer (meaning you don’t do it for a living), there is no reason why you would have one of these or even know about it. It’s not possible to see the color of light that your camera will see without a color meter. Our eyes are color correcting any light we look at so that’s why this is so hard. I’m just telling you this so that you don’t feel as bad with the struggles you’ve had. Also, please know, I’m shocked at how many “pro” photographers are running around out there without a color meter.
The lights you have with the 80 CRI will not give you accurate color with your glazes. It’s just not possible UNLESS you use a color meter and color correcting gels to get them to a neutral white balance. I’m actually surprised the photographer you hired did not do this for you. It’s the first thing I would have checked.
That being said, it would be cheaper for you to buy strobes or a good, quality LED panel light instead of a color meter. Quality strobes have a very stable white balance and are very neutral with a daylight color temperature.
For what you are doing, you can easily use one light and a fill card. This is a good strobe made by Godox– but you won’t like the price. It absolutely costs money to get decent, neutral, clean lights.
James L. Castner
Is using natural light outdoors an acceptable way of photographing ceramics? My next project will involve many pieces from 6-24 inches in size. What do you suggest as a background? Thank you!
Christina Peters
Hi James, if you are only photographing one piece of ceramic, you could make that work but photographing many pieces with the sun will be difficult. Your white balance will shift the entire time you are shooting. As the sun moves so does your white balance and exposure. Then let’s throw some clouds in there and you’ll be all over the scale in a way that will make you crazy.
I actually buy a lot of handmade ceramic pieces for my photography and you can always tell when the person took their pictures outside because there is absolutely no consistency in their product photography AND you really don’t know the true color of what you are going to get as a result of this. I’ve bought pieces from Etsy and was upset at what I ended up with as the colors just didn’t match.
Here’s another thing. What is the end use of that product? Will it be inside or outside? If the pieces are for potted plants THEN it is appropriate to photograph them outdoors because that is where the product will end up. It would make sense to show them with plants in them for scale in an environment as that will be how the customer will use them. Photographing them in the sun will let them see how they will look in the sun. Along with that, if you are using natural light, you must become an expert with color management and getting your products as accurate as possible in the images. You need a color corrected monitor and you must color correct each and every product image in editing.
When I am doing product photography, I use strobes in the studio and completely control the lighting. THEN I take all those products into my editing bay with me, sit them on a white surface and make sure every digital image matches what I see in person with that product.
As I’ve mentioned in other comments, this is a blog post about using artificial lighting for food – which is 10 times more forgiving than products are when it comes to using artificial light.
Please see Wyan’s comment before this one. I go into detail about product photography lighting there.
As for backgrounds, it’s hard for me to tell you what to use as it depends on how the images are going to be used. White is great so you can really see the piece. Sometimes, and only sometimes, when it’s done well, a little environment can work so long as there is nothing distracting in it AND it helps to feature the product and show it’s scale. Think of Pottery Barn or Crate And Barrel as reference.
Wyan
Hi Christina, this article is super helpful, thank you so much!
Am now looking at swapping the CFLs that came with my kit with LEDs BUT am in Australia.. I have just spent hours trying vainly to locate the equivalent bulbs here as we can’t order US or UK Amazon we can only buy from the Australian version which has very little and nothing like the one you have specified. I have tried various online retailers for the same bulb but can’t seem to locate anything.. very frustrating!
I don’t suppose you have any LED supply suggestions for us Australians?
Thanks again for your blog!
Christina Peters
Hi Wyan, for a lot of photography lighting, you won’t find it on Amazon. I just googled, “high CRI bulb Australia” and found these in a few minutes: https://reductionrevolution.com.au/products/verbatim-led-bulb-dimmable-e27-screw You’ll need to get a quad bulb adapter so that you can use several bulbs in one fitting for your light.
Wyan
Thanks for getting back to me Christina:) I was trying to find ones with a CRI 90 as advised (These only seem to be CRI 80?) but have given up as they don’t seem to be available in Australia. We ended up trialling a few different types from Bunnings, a hardware store here, they don’t match your criteria exactly but are a huge improvement on the CFLs that came with the kit, wish I had seen your post before I bought the kit!
We ended .up using 15W 5700K no cri advised.. that seemed to best match your measurements. They were AUD 11 each so that’s not too bad:)
This has been illuminating:) sorry you must get that all the time!,
I really appreciate your time and efforts to help people.
Wyan
Christina Peters
Hi Wyan, so glad you caught that! When I googled for lights the page I linked to had this listed as a CRI of 97 in the Google results. I hate it when they do that. You do need to call or email any manufacturer when they don’t list the CRI of a lighting product. As a rule though, if they don’t tell you the CRI, that means it’s under 90. They always brag when it’s a CRI over 90. What are you taking pictures of?
ed rodriguez
to my knowledge, there is no “color meter ” which can give instant readout of CRI as one can do for CCT ans other parameter
Incidentally, a human eye cannot really distinguish between photo with CRI 80 versus same shot with CRI 90–both of same CCT and lux level of course. 99% of professional photographers
do not do these kinds of controlled “engineering” experiments with LED lighting-.
Ed Rodriguez
OptoThermal Technologies
Wakefield MA
Christina Peters
Hi Ed, I never said there was a color meter that gave an instant readout of CRI. A photographic color meter tells you two things, the white balance in Kelvin and the tint, which is how much green or magenta is in the light (plus several other settings that I am not addressing here). Photographers use color meters to read the tint in a light to see how green it is – when a light is less than 90 CRI, it will have a green tint. When a light only has a CRI of 80, the tint is about 30-40 point green. This is the problem, especially if you want to mix a 5000K bulb with daylight. You use the color meter to figure out how much color correction gels are needed to put on the light to render it neutral. The gels that are of varying degrees of magenta for this exact reason. It’s a common problem.
Ed, our eyes are amazing at color correcting any light we look at. That is why this is very difficult for photographers who are starting out. So of course the eyes can’t see the difference between a light with CRI of 80 VS 90 – but our cameras sure do. That is why this is so important.
Ed, not sure what you are referring to when you say that “99% of professional photographers do not do these kinds of “engineering” experiments”. I take offense to that. Every pro shooter I know uses a color meter to balance lighting. I’ve been using one for 30 years as it was taught in school. The ONLY way to accurately measure the white balance of any light is with a light meter. What I am suggesting is not some form of wild shenanigans. We use color meters to balance lighting in a scene because our eyes are not capable of seeing what the camera will see with the light.
James L. Castner
I saw that you answered a question regarding ‘copy work’ by sending the person to another more appropriate blog. Do you know of such a blog or source of information for doing textile and garment photography? I am not talking about t-shirts that i want to sell on eBay, but rather fine blouses, tops, and shawls whose photos will appear in a book. I used your bulb information to help me get started but would especially like to know more about shooting in natural light and how to create an easy setup to do so. Thank you. Jim C.
Christina Peters
Hi James, I’m sorry I don’t have a referral for you. You need to study product photography. You will struggle using natural light. As I mention in the post the sun is moving all day and your color temperature will shift on you all day. I highly suggest you use artificial lights that have a high CRI to get accurate color, but even then fabric dies will shift when being photographed. It’s the nature of the beast. With each image you will need to color correct it to get accurate product color before you get it printed and make sure you are working on a calibrated monitor.
James L. Castner
Thanks very much for your quick reply. I did follow your suggestions for bulbs to establish an indoor studio setup, but with certain colors the natural light really made them ‘pop’ and look much closer to the actual color. I agree about the shifting light, wind, and other factors outdoor photography introduces. Thanks again! Jim C.
Christina Peters
Hi James, fabrics can have an assortment of whiteners, brighteners and other chemicals in them so some can look accurate under natural light, some look more natural under strobe light and some look more natural under tungsten light. It really just depends on the fabric, your light, your environment, what other light is bleeding into your set, and your camera as well. Just know that what you are experiencing is something that every product photographer goes through. The ultimate challenge is photographing a product and making it look in your photo just as it does in real life. I personally thing that photographing fabrics is one of the hardest things to do. I had a high end linen client for many years. Those were the toughest products to shoot by a long shot.
Jim Peliksza
Hi Christina,
Thank you so much for taking the time, not only to write this article, but also to continually update it with your research into the latest available bulbs! I have a question specific to my application.
I will be shooting album covers – not the artwork that will go on album covers, but actual 12″x12″ albums. At first I will be selling them on eBay, and then later, once I’ve honed my technique, I will want to photograph my own collection. So my subjects are flat. And the room in which I am doing it is a about 7′ wide by about 10′ long and it is built under a small eave in my upstairs (two slants for the ceiling). Not a lot of space to work with. The main light source is an overhead, bare fixture (i.e. no globe or anything around it) that has a daylight LED bulb. Sounds perfect, right? 😉
So my question is, what can I do to improve my lighting situation without going too crazy on budget? I have tried an inexpensive ESDDI soft box with a 85W 5500K bulb (not sure about the CRI), but it seems to really wash things out. Should I just work on the overhead situation? What would you recommend?
Thank you!
Jim
Christina Peters
Hi Jim, the type of photography you are doing is actually called copy work. I’ve done an extensive amount of this in college and for Disney when I worked there for about a minute. There is way too much to cover here in a comment to tell you how to do this. As this blog is about food photography I’m going to send you over to another blog post which will set you perfectly for what you want to do – you need to learn about Angle Of Incidence my friend, this is why you are getting glare. You should polarize your lights and your lens as well. You cannot use the overhead light. Check out the post here.
Jim Peliksza
Christina,
Thank you so much for your quick reply! The article you linked to was really helpful. Sounds like I need to reconfigure my space to allow for two lights, one on either side, and smaller ones than the huge soft box I was trying to use. If you don’t mind, I have a couple of follow-up questions:
1) The article mentions a color card. I have already ordered a grey card; do you think that’s sufficient for WB correction?
2) You suggested that I shouldn’t use the overhead. The rest of the upstairs is lit with overhead florescent lights. Is it OK if there is some bleed from those into the little nook where I am shooting? Or should I turn all the lights off except for the two side lights?
3) Given that I only have about 4-5 feet on either side of my subject, do you think this type of light with an umbrella and polarizing gel would be sufficient? 5″ or 10″ dome?
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/487997-REG/Impact_401486_Tungsten_Two_Floodlight_Kit.html
Thank you again! This has been really helpful!
Jim
Christina Peters
Hi Jim, to answer your questions #1 – gray card will be great #2 – do not have ANY lights on at all other than your lights lighting the artwork, #3 – you can’t polarize light and then put an umbrella on it – this is defeating the purpose of the polarizer. Use a direct light source – no modifier. That Impact flood kit would be great – no umbrellas.
Jim Peliksza
Thank you for all your help Christina! I think I am confidently set on a path now. And my apologies for veering off course a little with the questions about copy work. I do appreciate your expertise, though!
Jim
Christina Peters
Hi Jim, no problem, you’re welcome and good luck.
Rochelle
Hi there! I can’t tell you what a helpful article this has been! Thank you!! 🙂 For my purposes, I have been leaning more toward purchasing a few LED panels over buying soft boxes. However, I just read that LED’s require a really fast aperture lense, when shooting ‘up close’ and that something about my iso needing to be 400/800… Therefore, are using LED panels with cell phone cameras out of the question? Do they only work well with actual DSLR cameras? I will be shooting myself to read scripts, as I am an actor… probably a few feet away from the light source. I don’t know much about photography/iso’s, but any advice is so extremely appreciated! 🙂
Christina Peters
Hi Rochelle, you really need a tripod when using an artificial light source that is constant. When ever anyone is telling you your ISO needs to be at 400 or 800, just ignore that. Your ISO is dictated by whether you are using a tripod or not and how dark your scene is. Depending on your phone, many of them are getting great at shooting in darker environments. LED panel lights will be very harsh on you. You’ll have to heavily diffuse them. I highly suggest a ring light that you can put your camera in the middle of like this one: https://amzn.to/3eb4X3G This brand has high CRI lights – I have one of their just like this and it works well.
Anthony
Hi Christina – just a quick note to say thanks for sharing all the great information! Any recommendations on a color meter?
Christina Peters
Hi Anthony, well – there are not a lot of options unfortunately and they are expensive. This is the only meter that I am aware of that is currently being made – it’s made by Sekonic. There is another device that is much cheaper made for iphones that I found on amazon. I have no idea how accurate it is. It’s made by Luma (I’ve never heard of) and a there are reviews about it being wildly inconsistent and the manufacturer not responding to return it.
Barbara
Hi, thank you for your information. I am a portrait painter and have moved my studio so that I can get consistent light. Do you recommend led or cfl? I am thinking about getting a softbox with two switches to enable the light to go from three 24 watt cfl bulbs to seven 24 watt cfl bulbs with a cri of 91. I have read that led lights cause macular degeneration. What are your thoughts?
Christina Peters
Hello Barbara, in this article I very openly tell you my thoughts on CFL’s so please look for that. I’m not a fan. I have no knowledge about macular degeneration. That sounds terrifying. I would do more research about that, talk to your eye doctor and as you are a painter where you will be working under artificial lights for long periods of time, get the best lights out there. LED’s do have a flicker so ask your eye doctor about that.
Mahidua
This is very helpful information. I learn so much from you as well! Thank you so much for sharing. Keep it up.
Christina Peters
You’re welcome Mahidua. Thanks for reading the blog!
Terry Gess
Thanks for clarification on 3000 vs 5000. Mu other question was regarding how many 4 socket adapters I might need when using LED bulbs. I’ll start with one 4 socket adapter and see how it goes. Thanks for your help!
Christina Peters
Hi Terry, I have no idea how many lights you would need but starting with one adapter sounds like a good idea.
Sarah
Hi Christina, I am following your recommendation in this article and purchase the 4in1 socket and 4x high CRI LED bulbs. My only question is why you chose 3000k instead of 5000k? Wouldn’t 5000k be more similar to daylight? I was going to purchase 5000k CRI 92/16W for food photography, but thought I check on the color temperature. Thanks
Christina Peters
Hi Sarah, sorry if I caused any confusion for you. I am mixing my LED lights with tungsten lights so that’s why I got the 3000k bulbs. 5000K is for daylight, however, very rarely is daylight at exactly 5000k. The color of daylight radically shifts all day long. The kelvin is always moving around. Tungsten lights, artificial lights never change their color temp.
Terry Gess
Good info – Thanks! But still confused on 300 K vs 500 K. When shooting objects indoors with no other light: Would I want 3000K or 5000 k? Any idea how may banks of 4 in 1 high CRI bus I might need?
Christina Peters
Hi Terry, You can use either 3000K or 5000k – it won’t matter if you aren’t mixing them with any other kind of light. You just have to make sure they have a high CRI number (over 93). I’m not sure what you mean by you last question about banks?
Michelle
Hi Christina,
First of all thank you so much for your explanation! I also agree with the other ladies. You provide the best information that I could find!
And like them I also photograph clothing to sell online (without a model). I’m in between getting those LED Bulbs mentioned above or LED (video) light panels. What are your thoughts on the panels?
Thank you so much and keep up the good work!
Michelle
Christina Peters
Hi Michelle, the panels can work fine – the absolute most important thing for photographing fabrics is that you must have lights with a high CRI – if you don’t do that, you are using green light, and your colors will shift. Now, that being said, many fabrics contain dyes in them that are going to shift when you photograph them anyway so, to limit this as much as possible, you have to get the high CRI lights so that you are not making this issue worse.
James L. Castner
Thanks for your prompt reply. I’ve already downloaded the Artificial Light Guide and look forward to reading it. Can you tell me where I would find the four socket adaptor that you use in your light box? for example, would B & H or a photo store like that have it? Thanks again for your help, and for putting such information together in the first place.
Christina Peters
Hi James – this is the link to the adapter in the post that I use: https://amzn.to/2VDDOxD Click on the link that says “available from these sellers”.
James L. Castner
Hi Christina, Thank you for a very informative article. I wish to photograph garments on mannequins for use in a book that includes a section on textiles. I do not have any light boxes but was wondering if your 4-socket adaptor with four A-21 Hyperikon 16W daylight (5000K) bulbs could be used in conjunction with a reflector like those on clamp lights but bigger? The setup would be a key light on one side, a fill light on the other, and a background light behind the mannequin. Do these 4-socket adaptors have a plug to an outlet? What typically supports them? The stand of the light box? I’m unclear on that part. I was on the verge of buying a light kit online, but your article informed me that there were many things regarding the bulbs of which I was unaware. Thanks again.
Christina Peters
Hi James, thanks for reading the blog. I would not use the 4 socket adapter in a clip light. They weren’t designed for that and the weight would be difficult to stabilize. The 4 socket adaptors do not have their own plug. They have to screw into a light head made for this. I use these in a light box with a heavy duty light stand. So imagine a regular light head / softbox but instead of one bulb in the softbox, you use the adapter with 4 bulbs. I do have a free ebook that shows you more details on that with pictures.
Tammy Warner
Hi Christina,
Like Miriam I want to thank you as I have been searching the web also trying to find info and yours is the best I’ve found also!!
I am doing the same thing as Miriam, selling clothing online, and have been for the last year. But lately I have been having so much trouble getting the picture colors to match the actual clothing. I have been having to spend way to much time editing only to have them still not look as accurate as I like.
As a bulb ages, does it’s color temp change?
Also, I know you told Miriam to get bulbs with the highest CRI and with the same WB, (white balance?).
Do you have any suggestions on a certain bulb? Would the one you mentioned above work? I know that manufacturers will say if they are 3000, 4000k or whatever, but I’m confused on how to find out what the CRI and WB of a bulb is.
Thanks for the great information you provide!!
Tammy
Christina Peters
Hi Tammy, when a manufacturer has a high CRI bulb, they advertise that because the majority of bulbs don’t have a high CRI. This could absolutely be the reason you are struggling with color. When you photograph something with a green light (your eyes can’t see it because they are color correcting every light source you look at) you will not be able to get accurate color. It’s not possible with a low CRI bulb. That’s why this setting is called “color rendering index” it’s telling you how accurate your colors will be rendered in the image. There is no such thing as a 100 CRI bulb, but the bulbs I am linking to here are over 90 and that’s good. The highest I ever saw was a bulb with a CRI of 96. In the article I list specific bulbs and tell you their CRI. That is why I am recommending them. I don’t recommend bulbs with a lot CRI.
Miriam Reilly
Hi Christina,
I am currently looking for new bulbs for my Fovitec StudioPRO Softboxes in which I use for taking photos of clothing to sell online. I am by no means a professional photographer but I’m doing my best with what I have. They came with 45w CFLs and I have trouble with reds, pinks & even blacks. I have 3 softboxes and each one has 5 bulbs. I’m thinking the LED lights would be perfect, I wouldn’t have to buy the 4-socket adapter you mentioned. What I’m wondering is should I still be using the filters on the soft boxes? Btw this was the most helpful information I have been able to find the last 3 hours of my research. Thank you
Christina Peters
Hi Mariam, shooting fabrics is one of the toughest things to do. You are now in the product photography world and will have to get clear about your color management. That being said you have to make sure your lights have the highest CRI you can find (color rending index). You also have to make sure you get the same bulb from the same manufacturer with the same WB. I’m not sure what you mean by filters on the softboxes. There should be nothing else on the softboxes other than the diffusion panel that came with them unless you are using color correcting gels. You do have to make sure that each soft box is exactly the same, meaning the same brand, same fabric. So every one of your lights must be identical in every way so that you don’t get any white balance shifting. Hope that helps.
Ash
Hi Christina! Thanks for this informative article!
I’m just wondering, can we use this 4 LED bulbs socket adaptor in one of the softboxes you recommended above?
Christina Peters
Hi Ash, you absolutely can and that’s what I do in the summer time. Those tungsten bulbs are hot and the LEDs put out much less heat. What you can’t do is put four 500 watt tungsten bulbs in there because those lights are only rated for 500 watts.
Kaitlyn Nystul
Hi Christina! I saw above that you purchased the 3000k bulbs. If I’m going to be shooting with a combo of natural light and artificial light would you recommend going for the 4000k or the 5000k?
Christina Peters
Hi Kaitlyn, thing is daylight has a much higher kelvin then tungsten, those two colors of light will never work together. They are complete opposite each other in the white balance scale. So I can’t tell you which bulb to use. It’s all about which light is the dominant light sources and work off of it from there. You really need a color meter to measure your space and use lights based on what your color meter says the light is. There are some LED’s that have a mix of bulbs so that you can customize your light to match when in the situation you are talking about. They are called bi-color led light panels.
calum
sorry if this is a dumb question, but if you need a color meter to be able to measure differences, why does it matter, as people will be viewing images with their eyes, not color meters?
Christina Peters
Hi Calum, the color meter is used to tell you how your camera will see the light – not your eyes. Our eyes don’t show us the real color of light. You need to know if there is green color in the light or how blue or yellow it is in order to know how to properly balance your white balance.
Jennifer
Question for you: for the Hyperikon lights, do you use the daylight or crystal white bulb?
Christina Peters
Hi Jennifer – I got this one: http://amzn.to/2yIUR7Z
nitin
I would love it if you did a video for using monolights! I purchased one, and being a novice I couldn’t get it to sync to my camera shutter speed, so I got a horizontal split of an image that’s half photo and half all pure blackness. I guess the light was shooting quicker than my lens. I figured that out and I couldn’t shoot any slower than 1/250. Anyway nice article! Thanks for sharing all the info here!
Christina Peters
Hi Nitin, I actually will have videos on strobes in the Food Photography Club. Make sure to get on the wait list for that so you don’t miss our next launch. That being said, you should be able to shoot slower than 1/250th, it would be going faster is the issue. Each camera has their own preferred syncing speed and normally a slower shutter wouldn’t cause the half frame issue. What strobes are you using and with which camera?