I need tips on photographing clothes

[iisfaq]

My partner has a small childrens' clothing business and I need to photograph her clothing samples to put online.

I currently use a Panasonic DMC-FZ1 digital camera and I am getting quite bad results - the colours do not match at all. Greens are way off and I do not seem to be able to adjust the colours using software to match the product.

I have been looking at a Nikon D70 but it also appears to be having problems (automatic mode). I beleive that with more manual control I may get a closer more accurate copy.

Is there any tips such as a particular lighting I should or need to use? I am not a commerical photographer and I just need some tips to better capture these products.

Any help would be appreciated.

Chris

[92135011]

1) what light source are you using?

2) what are you comparing your product to? the screen or a printed version?

[another view]

I think most of your problem is coming from the white balance of the camera. We didn't worry about this with film because it wasn't adjustable - other than using filters. If you shot negative film and it was reasonably close, the lab corrected it anyway.

With digital, the white balance is adjustable. If you've ever shot slides without any filters then you may have a better feel for this - imagine shooting a slide inside a building with incandescent lights - it'll have a strong amber color cast. Now shoot outside on a heavily overcast day - everything will have a bluish cast. With digital you can adjust the whites so that they're always white.

Problem is, auto white balance isn't perfect - much like auto exposure. It'll be close and in many cases close enough, but when color is critical you'll have to take extra steps. Basically, a custom white balance is having the camera measure a piece of white paper under whatever light you're using so you can shoot with that information. With different colored clothes and/or backgrounds an auto white balance will change even though the lighting didn't.

You can do this with a D70 but I'm not sure about the Panasonic. Another advantage of the Nikon (again, not sure on the Panasonic) is the ability to use RAW files - the camera doesn't set white balance at time of capture, you do it later in Photoshop or Nikon Capture. But this is more stuff to buy and you'll need to calibrate your monitor (again more stuff to buy). If you don't calibrate the monitor, then how do you know what you're looking at? I use Monaco Optix XR but Gretag/MacBeth Eye One is good too. Actually, I'd recommend calibrating the monitor no matter what you end up doing.