Skip to main content

Prop collecting is a sickness

It doesn't matter if you are a portrait photographer, a still life photographer or a commercial product photographer, props are an essential part of your world. For the most part props are purchased on an "as needed" basis. Other times it's when opportunity presents itself.

I have come to a point in my career that I subconsciously keep an eye out for items that may be useful as a prop. The funny thing is I never know when or where I'll find them, or what, for that matter.

Recently I was at the supermarket and I happened to walk past a shelf loaded up with those classic mass produced Coca-Cola glasses. As they were on sale and I could always use glasses like these I decided to pick up a set of four... and here is where the sickness starts.

I picked up a couple and was ready to just place them into my basket when I noticed a defect on the lip of one of the glasses. It was just a little excess of glass that made a noticeable lump on the lip of the glass. "This is no good," I thought to myself. That'll never photograph well. Then i noticed the seam line on the other glass. A very hard and very obvious seam line where the two halves of the mold come together in manufacturing. While I could not avoid a seam I could find glasses with a minimized seam. That's when it started.

I went through every single glass on that shelf looking for a set of four "suitable for photography" drinking glasses. Out of about forty glasses I came away with the best four of the bunch. Anyone watching me would have thought I had some kind of obsessive compulsive disorder, picking up one glass after the other, comparing it with the next, dismissing them on forensic fashion.

Here are a few criteria to judge whether you should buy a prop, in no particular order;

  • Will you use that prop, either immediately or in the near future? The more use you get out of a prop the higher the return on your investment. Simple math.
  • Is it a rare item that is difficult to acquire? If you are in a position to ever use that prop but will find it hard to acquire later it makes sense to grab it when opportunity presents itself.
  • Is the price to good to refuse? Sometimes even items that won't get too much use are worth getting if they are bought at a significant savings.

The good thing is that I now have four decent Coca-Cola glasses. Since I photograph food I can now deliver that classic Coke shot without a last minute scramble for that glass and that's what you need to consider when prop shopping. Don't buy something just because. If there is a need, if it is a unique item or if it's a bargain of a lifetime, grab it. But if it's something that is readily available at any time, get it as you need it. While my need wasn't immediate it is a possibility because of the nature of my work. While not rare, they are sometimes hard to find and, lastly, they were on sale for super cheap. So even if I don't use them too often, the return on my investment was worth the purchase.

So what have been some of your most unusual prop purchases? Was it worth it? Let me know in the comments section.

Comments

Most Popular Posts

Don Julio - Hero Shot

For starters, a hero shot is one in which the product is showcased in all its splendor. Careful attention is placed on making the product look its very best. For this shot of Don Julio I knew I wanted to give the bottle some majesty by photographing it from a low angle. That low angle makes the bottle look tall, towering over the viewer and creating a position of dominance. Can't you hear the choir of angels singing in the background? I also knew that I wanted a rich, moody image with lots of darks. I am partial to darker images, which is surprising to most people because the majority of the work I do are images on white backgrounds. But that's another story. I also tried a lifestyle type shot with glasses and lime slices but I wasn't feeling it and ended up scrapping it. Again, that's another story.

Observations on composition - Pieter Bruegel

In this article I am reprinting a critique I published on photoMENTORIS.com regarding the painting entitled ' Census at Bethlehem ' by famed painter Pieter Bruegel , who was born in what is now the Netherlands in the 1520s. The first point I would like to say is that you first need to consider both the medium and the time frame of this painting. Being a painting, the artist has a certain advantage of being able to carefully direct the large amount of content presented to the viewer, unlike, say, a photo of opportunity of the street photographer (I strongly believe Pieter would have been the 'street photographer' of his time). Even a studio photographer, with the luxury of space and time, would have a hard time justifying creating such a complex composition. Where you would see this type of visual composition today would be in modern cinema. In particular, period pieces that rely on background elements to "sell the era" .  Secondly, the era in which thi

Who Cares About Your Business

October marks the beginning of the holiday season with Halloween at the end of the month. Seasonal items are being shuffled around and soon Thanksgiving, Christmas and Hanukkah will be upon us. Personally, I have been busy preparing for the cold weather and analyzing how to move forward into the new year. This got me thinking about many things; rescaling my marketing, updating my prices, expanding my services… you know, all the regular business stuff. It also got me thinking about my customers... actually, the customers I don’t have. What can I do to help them find me? Then it hit me, if they did find me, why would they care?  This month’s newsletter is about ways of connecting to customers in today’s age of information.

What is the new normal after COVID?

A very large oak was uprooted by the wind and thrown across a stream. It fell among some Reeds, which it thus addressed: “I wonder how you, who are so light and weak, are not entirely crushed by these strong winds.” They replied, “You fight and contend with the wind, and consequently you are destroyed; while we on the contrary bend before the least breath of air, and therefore remain unbroken, and escape.” - Aesop's Fable