The Presentation
For this lesson, we wanted to demonstrate how to go about lighting and photographing jewelry using just one light and a reflector. Our idea was to create an overhead view of an engagement ring and a wedding band propped up by the branch of a young orange tree. We also decided to add some tiny flowers from a nearby wild bamboo plant.

For many jewelry dealers and resellers, it often pays to get creative with props like this for marketing purposes. As any ad agency will tell you, the presentation of a product in marketing collateral is generally more important than the actual product itself.

But for many people, simply creating beautiful photographs of their wedding rings is enough, and well worth the effort.

First, we rolled in a homemade, plywood shooting table, suspended a 4-foot wide roll of white seamless background paper using a Photoflex ProDuty Support Kit, and clipped the front end of the paper to the table using spring clamps. [figure 1]

We placed the rings and branch near the front right corner of the table so that we could have flexibility in positioning our camera and lighting gear. Once we had the rings arranged, we positioned a tripod-mounted E-3 with a 50mm macro lens attached in close and framed up the shot. This is the ideal lens for coming in close to your subject and locking down sharp focus.

The Before Shot
For comparison purposes, we first took a fully automatic shot with the built-in flash enabled. [figures 2, 3 & 4]

In the result shot, we noticed a couple of things right away. First, the quality of light was plain and flat. While the rings were illuminated adequately, there was no real sense of depth to the shot, and there were harsh shadows cast from the branches, caused by the flash.

Secondly, the wide aperture setting [automatically set to f/2.0 in the Program mode] on the macro lens caused the depth of field to be so shallow that the background and edges of the rings were rendered much too blurry, particularly in the top half of the frame.

Switching to Manual Exposure
Next, we set the exposure mode in the camera to Manual, which would allow us to adjust the aperture setting and shutter settings. We set the aperture to f/7.1, set the shutter speed to 1/200th of a second for an appropriate shutter speed, and set the White Balance to 5000K (or Daylight) to match the color temperature of the multi-wireless flash we'd be using next. [figure 5]

NOTE: The Olympus wireless flash system does allow for fully automatic TTL operation. This can be a very handy feature when you have to work fast and do not have enough time to set the flash output manually. However, TTL flash will not allow the same level of precision and control that is available when working with completely manual settings.

For this particular set-up, we had plenty of time and opted to have fully manual control over the exposure and flash output.

Configuring the FL-50R Flash
Once the camera was dialed in, we proceeded to set up our key light, an Olympus FL-50R flash unit angled into a Photoflex 45-inch White Shoot-Through umbrella. This also required the use of a Photoflex Shoe Mount Multiclamp, which attaches to any standard light stand, holds any brand of shoe mount flash, and supports the use of many standard-sized umbrellas. [figure 6]

Using the RC Mode on the E-3
We then turned on the FL-50R and set it to the wireless RC mode, to Channel 1, and to the flash 'A' setting. To do this press the power button to turn on the flash and then press the mode button until the RC Mode appears on the LCD. Turn the left dial to toggle between channels and flash A through C. [figure 7]

At this point, the flash unit itself is set up and all of the controls to operate the flash can be from the camera. If you're still unclear about some of the terms mentioned above, such as the Channel 1 setting and the Flash 'A' setting, the following steps should clarify how these settings work.

The following set of diagrams illustrates the camera menu settings required to make the Olympus E-3 ready for wireless flash shooting. First turn the RC Flash mode on by navigating to Camera Menu 2, selecting the RC Mode option and selecting On from the sub-menu. [figures 8 & 9]

Once the RC Mode is turned on from within the camera menu, you can control virtually every aspect of your wireless flash operation right from the E-3's Info Menu.

In normal shooting mode, press the Info button until the RC Flash control menu comes up on the LCD. To navigate this menu, press OK, use the Arrow keys to highlight the different fields, and OK again to change settings for the selected field. [figure 10]

Before we continue, let's take a closer look at the various fields and settings inside the RC Mode control menu. Notice that there are three rows of flash settings labeled A - C. Then turn your attention to the lower right corner of the screen and notice the CH 1 (Channel 1) setting. This system has four channels with each channel supporting three separate flash units.

For this still life shot, we used only one flash unit. We set the channel to CH 1 on the camera, as well as on the flash.

Selecting TTL (Through-The-Lens)
Back in the RC Flash control menu, you should see that the flash unit is set to the OFF setting. Select the Flash A OFF field, and press OK. Here you have the choice of TTL, Auto, or Manual flash operation for Flash A. We selected the TTL mode, which ensured that our key light would properly exposed without any trial and error. [figure 11]

Throwing Soft Light
With the shoot-through umbrella mounted to the FL-50, we were now ready to improve the lighting of the shot. We first started by positioning the umbrella to the right of the set about four feet away and took a shot.

Remember that the multi-wireless flash needs to be triggered with the built-in flash of the camera in order to fire. However, the power setting of the built-in flash in this mode is minimal, just enough to trigger the flash, and will not greatly affect the lighting of most shots. [figures 12 & 13]

With just this one light, we see a big improvement. The shadows are soft and gradual, the lighting on the rings looks more natural, and there is an increased sense of dimension to the shot overall. Also notice how the increased depth of field, caused by the aperture setting of f/7.1, greatly improves the overall feel of the shot.

However, on closer inspection, we noticed two more things. First, there was a minor shadow of the flowers cast by the built-in flash. but we ended up agreeing that this added a nice touch to the shot. If you wanted to eliminate this shadow, you could simply place a 12" diffused LiteDisc in front of the flash, which would diffuse the shadow and make it unnoticeable.

Secondly, we noticed that the diamonds looked a little too dark, which meant that we needed to throw some more light into them to make them pop. Getting stones to light up is a common challenge with rings and other jewelry, as the facets are set at various angles and tend to reflect everything in the room.

Bringing the Light in Tight
One of the easiest ways to illuminate more of the facets in a ring is by bringing your diffused light in tighter. This works for both shoot-through umbrellas and soft boxes. The closer your light is to your subject, the larger it becomes. And the larger your light is, the more reflections you'll be able to project off of the facets.

With the umbrella now less than one foot away from the rings, we took another shot. [figures 14, 15 & 16]

As you can see from the result, the repositioning of the umbrella really helped to increase the number of reflections in the main diamond.

Keep in mind that when you move your main light in closer, it will also affect the contrast and level of diffusion in the shot. Notice here how the lighting of the overall shot seems lower in contrast than before and that the shadows are shorter and softer. This all ties in to the following principle:

The closer your light is to your subject, the softer the quality of light will be.

Bouncing Light into Facets
While repositioning the umbrella made an improvement, we still wanted to get more light into the diamonds of the rings. Rather than add another light, we simply attached a small, 12-inch silver reflector to a grip arm and light stand and angled it to bounce light from the umbrella back into the shadow side of the umbrella.

Before we finalized the position of the reflector, we decided to readjust the rings slightly, since we were still playing with composition somewhat. Once the positioning was where we wanted it, we took another shot. [figure 17, 18 & 19]

The result was a big improvement, particularly on the main diamond. Notice how this small reflector added a significant amount of punch to the rings. There are several different ways to pull out the sparkle in jewelry like this, but this is probably one of the simplest.

Repositioning the Main
While the light on the diamond was much improved, we noticed that the shot overall seemed to be a little too low in contrast now compared to the early shots. So now we wanted more contrast, but we also wanted to have enough light reflecting into the diamonds.

In an effort to achieve both, we decided to move the main light around so that it was closer to the angle of the main diamond, but set back a couple of feet to maintain the contrast we wanted. We also decided to angle the engagement ring slightly to improve its reflections traveling up into the lens.

Once the umbrella was in position, we took another shot. [figures 20 & 21]

The result shows an improved amount of light reflecting into the main diamond, while still maintaining a good contrast ratio.

The middle diamond in the wedding band was a little blown out, so we moved the umbrella to the side somewhat to throw off the direct reflection. We then decided to bring the silver reflector back in to reflect a little light into the right side of the rings. [figure 22]

Once these adjustments were made, we took our final shot. [figure 23]

The effects of the silver reflector helped achieve the balance we were looking for. The reflections in the diamonds looked great and the overall contrast was at a level we liked.

Remember that while we just used one shoot-through umbrella and a reflector, jewelry sets can get fairly intricate with many different lights, reflectors, gobos, etc., involved. Should you decide to add lights and lighting modifiers to your arsenal, you’ll discover how best to incorporate them into your basic lighting approach. Keep in mind that it’s always best to start simple and then build to it from there.

As always, remember to experiment with your lights and camera settings, and above all, have fun!