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So I've been a long term painter and player, even entered some of my painted works into contest before. But recently I've tried to photograph some of my models and the pictures have not done them justice. How do you guys get sick nice photos of your models?

Edit: Autocorrect got WEIRD. Sorry 'bout that...

The key in photography is usually lighting. Get it somewhere where it is well let by natural light or good lamps. Try different angles and if using natural light try different times of the day. Make sure your camera is set to the correct white balance so the colours look as accurate as possible.If you're not happy with the colour then look into metering if your camera supports it. Outside of lighting and white balance it should mostly come down to preferences with how you stage.

I'm no expert so others can probably give more in depth tips but this is a few quick and easy steps that can really improve photos and have improved my results.

Some quick tips.

1: Use two sources of light, on either side of your mini and on the same side as the camera. Don't back-light. Lighting from both sides works because when painting minis, we create artificial highlights and shadows, so you don't want the "real" lighting distracting from that.

2: Use white as the backdrop. White reflects the light best, and helps with the "all-around" lighting you want to have.

3: Use the highest resolution your camera is capable of, and take the picture from about 1 foot away. Better cameras can get closer, maybe 6". You can then use a photo / picture editing program to crop away any excess, while keeping the focus on the mini. Windows comes with "Paint" to the best of my knowledge, that you can use easily to crop the picture.

4: I find that "warm white" LED lights are the best household lights to use for photographing minis, but that's just me.

Look into making or buying a lightbox.

Older tutorial but I cant imagine much has changed;
https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/317430.page

Typically with a camera

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2018/03/06/the-model-photo-how-to-photograph-models-for-display/

 greatbigtree wrote:
Some quick tips.

1: Use two sources of light, on either side of your mini and on the same side as the camera. Don't back-light. Lighting from both sides works because when painting minis, we create artificial highlights and shadows, so you don't want the "real" lighting distracting from that.

This one is really important. Photography captures less light than someone's eyes in most cases, which is why most cameras have a super bright flash attached to them. Two sources of light eliminates most natural shadows, which is ideal. For light sources, cheap bendy-neck desk lamps are fine, but for light bulbs, try and get true-spectrum bulbs.

2: Use white as the backdrop. White reflects the light best, and helps with the "all-around" lighting you want to have.

A bent sheet of white paper is the cheap option. A folding cloth lightbox can be found for decently cheap, however, and is much better. With lightbox + lamps + bulbs you're looking at less than $100 outlay to take much better pictures.

3: Use the highest resolution your camera is capable of, and take the picture from about 1 foot away. Better cameras can get closer, maybe 6". You can then use a photo / picture editing program to crop away any excess, while keeping the focus on the mini. Windows comes with "Paint" to the best of my knowledge, that you can use easily to crop the picture.

If you can get your camera's stats, look for minimum focal distance and optical zoom. Digital zoom is merely an emulation (picture cropping), so is worthless for getting resolution. Minimum focal distance is how close you can get and have the camera still focus. If you're planning on buying a camera to take pics of minis, look specifically for these stats!

4: I find that "warm white" LED lights are the best household lights to use for photographing minis, but that's just me.

I use true-spectrum phosphorescent bulbs personally, but any near-white bulb should do.

From my experience avoid taking any pictures that have non-white light on them.

Colours get changed a lot (and usually not for the better) when exposed to yellow or non-white light sources.

What camera and gear have you got and used and have you got any examples of photos to show? Sometimes seeing and hearing how you've taken your photos and what gear you've got can help as it helps give us an idea of what specifically works and hasn't worked for you.


This is especially true because the same error/issue can have multiple potential causes when its described casually; so one solution might not work or it might take several used at the same time to resolve the problem.

In addition its possible to be blind to some things when you're not experienced - eg how many new to model making can be blind to seeing mould lines until they are pointed out and then shown how to remove them. A common one I see with a lot of people is that they press the camera right up close and take photos of their model filling most of the frame, but being too close for the camera to focus on and thus most of the photo (model) is all blurry.

More pointers:

Most digital cameras will show the camera's focal point(s) as boxes on the screen if you half-way depress the shutter button. Some (mostly smartphones) allow you to adjust where that is, others require you to move slightly and try again. If only a small part of your miniature is in that box, most of the miniature isn't in focus!

Don't just take one single picture either; take at least 4-5 for every angle you wish to post, then select the best one. Vary each shot slightly (per above) with different focal points. Professional photographers take dozens of shots to get one good one, and photography in general is a numbers game. More shots means a better chance of a good photo.

Post some recent images and we can critique from there.

Focus & lighting are usually an issue with macro photography.

Use good lighting.
For all that is good an holy, USE A TRIPOD if you can. There are mounts for phones these days. Camera shake from hand holding is #1 cause of the fuzzies. Even image stabilising cannot completely remove this issue.

Camera shake from button pressing is #2 cause for the fuzzies (even on a tripod. IS does help here, though).

Incorrect focal distance and/or aperture also contribute to the fuzzies. I grew up with cameras and lenses where the DoF scale guide was printed on the lens shell, near the focus ring.
Focal length (find the minimum FL and do not go closer) is important, as are aperture and shutter speed.

This is the "tripod" of photography. All three legs combine to make the picture. Aperture affects the light, so does the shutter speed.
Aperture also affects depth of field (what is in focus at a given focal length). The larger the number, the smaller the aperture and the more light needed for the shot (so longer shutter speeds) and the more that will be in focus.

Also certain cameras STILL have issues with white backgrounds (it can cause the camera to underexpose the subject in order not to overexpose the background). This has been an issue since film days. Nikon is pretty good with white backgrounds.
A "neutral" background is better. Reference for "white" is actually STILL 18% neutral grey. A soft grey or a grey graduated (or even a blue grad) background might work better.