You need photos for your website? Then you can hire a photographer or get started yourself. This is fun to do, but some prior knowledge is necessary. Are you going to take website photos yourself? Discover in this article 9 tips to get started right away!
Photos are incredibly important to a site: it’s the first thing your visitors look at. Good photos ensure that you leave a professional impression and that people stay on your site. So photography can make or break your online pages.
What website photos do you need?
Before you start photographing right away, it’s a good idea to consider what photos you need first. A portrait of yourself or a group portrait of your team is necessary anyway, this creates confidence. In addition, you can portray your workplace as well as your products.
Also helpful: consider what impression you want to leave behind. What is the purpose of the photos? What feeling should they convey? If you want to radiate calm, work with minimalist settings. Or do you want to radiate dynamism? Then let people move.
Would you rather not do this yourself? Find out what other ways ways to get good website photos.
9 tips create your own website photos
1. Placement of your subject: choose a quiet setting
Once you know what you are going to photograph and what impression you want to leave, you can start looking at places to photograph. Is it about people or products? Then it is best to choose a quiet, beautiful background. That way the focus will really be on the person or product.
Can’t find a peaceful background right away? Then create it yourself. For example, you can hang white cloths.
Looking for more tips on portrait photography? Then read here how to make a great portrait!
2. Camera position: freehand or on tripod?
Up to 1/125 shutter speed, you can always shoot with the camera in hand. If you start working with slower shutter speeds, there is a chance of motion blur. Some people can do this without a problem up to 1/30 or 1/15, you have to try this yourself. But if you work with slower shutter speeds, it is best to opt for a tripod.
You also need to consider where you place your camera. Do you need a lot or little background? Photos with plenty of background do well on websites: they breathe and give a sense of space. Good for your visitor!
3. Time of day: early, late or mid-day?
Working with soft light gives you the most beautiful images. You generally have that early in the morning, late afternoon or evening. If you work at noon, you may find that the light becomes very hard and the photo becomes less beautiful.
In addition, the time of year also affects your images. In summer you often have hard light, in other seasons softer light. Are you going to shoot in the summer? Then you should shoot very early or very late. Want to be sure of beautiful light? Then choose a sunny day in February or November and you’ll be amazed at the results!
4. Choice of light source: daylight, lamp light or flash
Are you photographing in a place with enough daylight? Then you don’t need a lamp or flash light. Is there little to no daylight? Maybe you can use ambient light present if there are ambient lamps. Is it still too dark? Then you can go flash. Or are you shooting against the sun? Then the flash can also come in handy.
5. Incidence of light: this is leading
Photography literally means writing with light. As a photographer, you let the light guide you, then you can work on your composition. Are you photographing people? Have them turn their faces toward the light. Then there is a greater chance of catch eyes or twinkle eyes, especially if you are near a window.
Should you work early or late, you can sometimes put your subject in direct light. But often indirect light gives the very best results.
Looking for more tips on daylight photography? Check out here how to take the best photos without flash.
6. Set your camera manually and shoot in RAW
Setting your camera completely manually requires some prior knowledge. After all, it involves ISO, shutter speed, aperture, light metering, way of focusing and, if necessary, setting the white balance. To get this right, you really do need some training.
Often you can let cameras choose whether to shoot in JPEG or RAW. RAW is a digital negative; JPEG is a digitally developed representation of the photograph. A photo in JPEG contains less information than a photo in RAW. Want to do the developing and editing yourself? Then it’s best to photograph in RAW.
Wondering how to manually set your camera? Find out how to set your camera like a pro here!
7. Digital development of photographs
As mentioned, it’s best to import RAW files. You can develop these your way with a digital darkroom like Lightroom. Once you start exporting them, you can assume that 72 dpi is enough for a website.
8. Editing photos
In recent years, you can edit more and more images digitally in Lightroom. A lot of photographers try to solve as much as possible with Lightroom. As soon as they hit the limitations of this program, they switch to Photoshop.
9. Resizing photos
If you export photos in Lightroom today, chances are they are up to 35 MB in size. That’s really way too big for a website. Heavy files slow down the website. And with a slow website, you drive your visitors away.
Resizing photos is a job in its own. On the one hand, you want to keep the files small, but on the other hand, you don’t want to lose quality. Sometimes you have to do this several times in a row to get the desired result.
Want to read more about resizing photos? Then read here how to make photos smaller.
Conclusion
And so creating website photos yourself turns out to be quite a job where prior knowledge is really necessary after all. Would you like to do it yourself? Then I wish you lots of fun and success! Do you prefer to outsource? Then look for a professional photographer.