Our latest product photography shoot for top stationery brand Yop and Tom is some of our best yet. Take a look at these stunning results…
To kick off 2022 at Pocket Creatives, we had a product Photography shoot booked in with one of our regular clients, Yop and Tom. They are a duo who live and work in London selling beautifully designed note books, planners and bullet journals which inspire and help their customers achieve their goals. We have a great relationship with Yop and Tom and have been lucky enough to have done a fair amount of product photography and other work for them in the past year, this has ranged from listing images, consisting of cutouts against white, creative product shots and lifestyle photography using models to help showcase their products. We also deliver these images in various resolutions to give them greater flexibility when using them across all platforms.
This particular product photography brief included all of the above, which meant we had lots of creative freedom and got to show off a wide range of our skills at the same time – always a bonus! The deliverables were a selection of listing shots for their website, (which had to be consistent with what we have shot for them previously). A variety of creative product images including flat lays, 45 degree designed shots and close up detailed shots were also on our to-do list, and finally, a collection of model shots that showed hands holding the journals and models posing with the journals in different set ups.
Attention to detail in product photography
There are two major aspects of this product photography shoot that had equal importance. How the gold emblem on the journals was photographed, and consistency. The gold emblem on the journals is the most decorative part of the product, it’s a shiny gold detail that needs to be lit correctly in order to capture it perfectly. This sort of material can be really challenging to capture correctly, particularly when you start adding in additional lights and getting more creative with the set ups.
Understanding small details like this is something that I always have to be mindful of with product photography. Our clients wanted some 45 degree shots with strong, defined shadows as the aesthetic – this had a huge impact on how the emblems were behaving under the lighting, so I had to be critical with my placement of both the journals and the lights in order to hit the sweet spot. It also became an issue when we got to the model shots – because we had our lovely model holding the products in various different positions, their movement was causing the lights to hit the products at the wrong angles and we were getting bad results. I managed to get around this problem by slowing down and giving very precise and clear direction to our model. The communication here was the key to success.
Delivering consistency in product photography
Now lets talk about consistency. This is super important whenever we shoot with Yop and Tom because we need all the images created as part of our product photography shoots to match once placed on their website. We also need to deliver a very high quality of work for them every single time we shoot.
Because this is a regular client, we already know what they do and don’t like when it comes to style and aesthetic. Our product photography producer, Bryony, combined a mixture of inspiration from what we have produced for them previously with new ideas and mood boards of things they like and visuals that we can interpret in Yop and Tom’s own style.
The production process was very smooth overall which resulted in our shoot day being very relaxed and fun for both us and the clients as every detail was looked after. We shot all of the product photography we needed to meet our brief in one full day in our studio in Waterloo. The tricky part of this shoot was making the studio look like different set ups with minimal props/styling when it came to the model shots. However, we were lucky enough to have the clients on set with us during the shoot which allowed for much faster feedback and as a result, much more quality when it came to the actual product photography images we delivered. We were also able to bounce ideas off of each other in real time, which meant the whole shoot felt more collaborative.
There’s a few things myself and the Pocket Creatives team do to ensure we have the best possible quality for any product photography shoot we undertake. For me as the photographer, if it’s a repeat client and I know I need to replicate results from a previous shoot, then I refer to one of my resources – something I like to call the ‘repeat cheat sheet’. I made this resource so I can document every detail I need to ensure consistency when working with repeat clients. It covers everything from lighting values, lighting positions and modifiers, product placement and set ups, camera positions, camera settings and even descriptions of the post processing preferences for after the shoot. This sheet has been a game changer, helping me ensure I’m delivering the same high quality results for our clients every time we shoot for them. The repeat cheat sheet is especially useful for things like product photography and other situations where you’re shooting in a closed controlled environment that you’ve shot in before, and you can rest assured that the rest of our team each has their own methods of maintaining excellent quality too.
“Great photoshoot for my brand here – we’ve used them multiple times now and every time it gets better and easier. Bryony and Kelly are amazing!”
Joppe Coelingh, Yop and Tom
Overall, we were all very pleased with the images we delivered on this product photography shoot. Usually when a project reaches the post production stage, it’s normal to expect a few revisions until we get the images exactly how our clients like them. This is because processing can be very subjective and what might be to our preference may not necessarily be to our client’s liking. One of the bonuses of working with a repeat client is you start to understand more and more about them and their likes and dislikes each time you work together, and this definitely worked in our favour in this scenario. We hit the nail on the head first time and both our clients and our team where all thrilled with the results.
As always, if you have any questions or would like to chat about your product photography needs please feel free to get in touch.
Kelly Hill, Photographer
“Fun, innovative and unflappable. Pocket creatives are great to work with – whether it’s finding the perfect lighting for trifle to capturing GoPro footage on a whisk, they always approach every situation with a steady yet game-changing attitude. I see the whole team as trusted creative partners to make great content together.”
Kitty Aldis, River Group
“I have been working with Steven and the brilliant Pocket Creatives crew for 3 years – in fact since they started out. They have captured in excess of 100 recipes, produced 7 videos including 2 crowdfunding campaigns, their work, professionalism, and commitment to client satisfaction second to none. What’s more is how they have developed, evolved and grown in creativity, experience, and inspiration.
On a personal front the individuals in the team have to most wonderful personalities – an absolute joy to work with!”
Tanya Robertson-Lambert, Tanya’s Just Real
“I worked with Steven and his Pocket Creatives team to create a recipe video, and I couldn’t recommend their services enough! From the ideation stage, through to filming and editing the finished product, at every stage, the whole team were first-class, going above and beyond to create a compelling, high-quality recipe video that generated heaps of engagement. I would definitely work them again.”
Ben Cullen, OLIO
