3 Mistakes to Avoid When Taking Flatlays
Scrolling through Pinterest and Instagram can be major sources of inspiration when it comes to photography. In your case, you’re looking for ideas to create beautiful flatlays for your product. But alas, you’ve tried and feel like you’ve failed. Taking flatlays is much harder than you thought!
Not to worry! Let me walk you through the 3 mistakes to avoid when taking flatlays so that you are able to create the best images for your products and look like a professional.
Mistake #1: Not using natural light to your advantage.
It is critical to use natural light for your flatlays if you want the light & airy look to your images. If you do not have natural light available, either move your location to a space that has plenty of natural light, or schedule your photo shoot to a time of day where natural light is plentiful. Once you have natural light, place your setup parallel to the nearest window, and stand perpendicular to the window when photographing. This will allow your products to be in view with even lighting.
Mistake #2: Incorporating too many props that distract from your main focus.
When it comes to the perfect flatlay, you want to make sure that your product is the main focus of the shot. In order to accomplish this, incorporating the right amount of props is crucial. The sweet spot is around 5 props at the most. Anything above this can bury the product in chaos.
Mistake #3: Using an aperture that is too low.
The lower the aperture, the most in-focus one aspect of your product will be, but the more out-of-focus the rest of the image will be. To clarify - with a lower aperture, you allow more light into the image, but you also lose focus on your product as a whole. You want the entire product to be clear & sharp, and by using a low aperture, you are really only focusing on one aspect of the product. I like to use a minimum aperture of 3.2 on flatlays - I’ve found that this is the perfect sweet spot for making sure that most things are in focus.