Over the last couple of years, I have been shooting glass panels for a Perth glass supplier based in Malaga. They offer a large selection of coloured and patterned glass, but also a range of core products including float glass, energy efficient glass, laminate and mirror.
The client needs all their glass panel photography on the same angle, showing the same couch scene in the background, half scene clear and half scene viewed through the glass. This way, their buyers are able to see the difference in transparency, colour and pattern of every different glass panel easily.
Mirror sheets are photographed on a white background, with some props at the front, in order to show how these props are reflected in the different coloured and painted sheets.
Similar to shooting metals, lighting glass is difficult due to the reflections it creates. Care needs to be taken to remove or minimise anything in the studio that may be seen in the images. These can include the camera stand, cords or lens as well as larger things like studio doors.
Stripped patterned glass panels are by far the hardest to photograph. This is because the camera needs to capture perfectly straight lines with same gaps in between columns while giving a sense of grove depth in each pattern design.
Shooting glass, due to its transparency and patterns, requires expertise to light and capture photographically. It is the reason clients call on the help of commercial product photographers to help them capture such images.
Recently I received a review from this client:
“We used Andrea for our website photography. Glass being the product we needed someone who understood the difficulty and the effect we wanted to achieve. Andrea was very understanding and flexible with the different set ups. The end result is stunning, a very professional and stylish display of our product.”
