OnSet Part 3: Lighting Tutorial - Rolex Watch

Hello! Welcome to my third lighting tutorial. In this tutorial, I will walk you through step by step on how I created the shot of the Rolex Watch. For this shoot, I wanted to create a vintage feel for the watch and focus on managing unwanted reflections from the watch. This is the final image we will achieve.

Gear

Camera and Lens:

• Nikon D750
• Nikon 105mm 2.8G Micro

Lighting:

• 2x Yongnuo YN560 II
• Yongnuo YN560 III
• Yongnuo YN560TX
• 1x 60x90cm Softbox
• 1x 3 in 1 Rogue Grid
• 1x 110cm Diffuser

Other:

• Textured paper as background
• Clamps
• Flags

Lighting Diagram and BTS

Step 1

Set the camera on a tripod and set up the props for the photo. For this photo I used a piece of textured paper as the background. The watch was placed flat on the background.

Step 2

With the camera and watch placed in position. Set camera settings to at least 1 stop under exposed and take a test shot. Make sure that no ambient light affects the flash exposure. For the key light, I decided to use a 60x90 cm strip softbox placed on subject left. This key light 's purpose was to provide a soft highlight on the left side of the watch.

Key Light

Step 3

As seen in Step 2 the photo, the light stand in the softbox is visible in the reflection. To remove the unwanted reflection and further soften the highlight, I placed a 110cm diffuser between the watch and the softbox. 

Diffused Key Light

Step 4

The photo from Step 3 is quite underexposed. To lift the exposure and shadows, I placed a second light with a bare bulb on behind the subject firing directly into the diffuser. 

Fill Light

Step 5

One of the crucial elements of product photography is managing reflections. From Step 4, the right and bottom side of the bezel has distracting reflections. To remove the reflections, two black flags were used as negative fill to create two uniform shadows.

Negative FIll

Step 6

The reflections from Step 5 are mostly removed. However, there is one more distracting reflection on the top side of the watch. A piece of baking paper was placed between Light B and the subject to diffuse the light while also eliminating the reflection.

Diffuse Reflection

Step 7

The photo from Step 6 can pass off as the final product, however, during the shoot I noticed the textured paper was very subtle. As a result, I ended up adding a third light with a Rogue 3-in-1 Grid attached. This light was placed on camera right, firing between the two pieces of negative fill to accentuate the textured paper with a beam of light.

Effect Light

Lighting

With all lights in place take the final photo for post production. Check out how each step builds onto the final shot in the slide show below:

A - Key Light

A - Diffused Key Light

B - Fill Light

Negative Fill

Diffuser

C - Effect Light

Post Production

The post production for this photo was completed by using Lightroom. I colour graded this photo with a green tint and warmed the white balance to create a vintage vibe. Check out the before and after below:

Final Image

This is the final image: