A Guide to becoming a Product Photographer for Amazon

Product photos are an essential component of any listing on Amazon and are the only thing a buyer relies on before making a purchase decision. This makes it important to equip your product listing page with striking visuals that show your product and its best features in the best way possible.

Alongside grabbing the attention of the customer, there is also a need to keep up with market trends and Amazon’s requirements for listing images

In this guide, I will elaborate on a few major facets of professional photography provided to you with Amazon Product Photography services alongwith some tips I have collected during my experience in this space to help you with your own product photos.

Planning Ahead of a Photoshoot

When starting off with Product Photography for Amazon, you have to keep the story you wish to tell through the images crystal-clear in your mind.

Doing this allows you to prepare all the relevant shots and angles you might need later on in your project, as setting up for a photoshoot again can be very time-consuming and a cause for frustration.

To help you plan, you can take a peek at your competitor’s images and take inspiration from them & also figure out what angles you may need for your images. As per my experience, it helps to shoot plenty of shots with the product in use.


It is essential to plan for three kinds of images for your listings:

• Images on a White Background
• Lifestyle Images
• Infographics           

Images on a White Background

Amazon requires main images to be shot on a white background that does not show the image’s outline in order to show it in a cleaner way on search results.



Setting up your camera is a bit technical and beyond the scope of this blog but the major settings you need is a wider depth of field by tweaking your aperture settings and a lower shutter speed to allow more light in.



With these settings, handling a camera would produce blurry images as it is impossible to keep a camera completely still. As a result, investing in a tripod would be highly beneficial for every part of your photoshoot to streamline your project.

To get a near perfect white backdrop for your images is as easy as using a large piece of cloth or a white chart paper, although your camera’s white-balance settings may still be a hindrance. In addition to a good backdrop, it is crucial you use ample lighting to minimise shadows in your image.

For your images to be ready for Amazon, they have to have your product cover 75% of the image. Another thing to keep in mind is that even a professional Amazon product photographer requires their images to be retouched before they’re totally ready for Amazon.

Lifestyle Images
Most studio-level Amazon Product Photography is done indoors, while seldom frequenting outdoor shoots for specific products. However, it is important to know the ins and outs of both for a novice Amazon Product Photographer.

Outdoor shots rarely have any lighting troubles and can be a breeze to shoot. It is common practice to use outdoor shots for fascinating lifestyle images which can really enhance the feel of your listing when combined with appropriate venue settings. Indoor lifestyle imagery can pose a challenge though and might require a bit of work on your lighting.

You can add a great deal of social proof to these images by utilizing models for your shoots, or becoming a model yourself. If you have any friends or family that would be interested in offering a helping hand, go for it!

Having diversity in the personnel appearing in your images can also elevate your brand’s values in the eyes of your customer. Just make sure that your product is clearly visible at all times.

Infographics

Getting your features down is the primary objective of listing images. With the help of infographics, you can showcase the primary and complex features or uses of your product with the help of graphic design and pictures of your product.

However, to successfully prepare your infographics for optimal performance you need to cater to them while planning for your shoot. Have any details the customer could do with seeing? Take a picture of it and show the customer exactly that.

Creating infographics is mostly an editing & graphic design job, but the basis of it lies in sufficient product photography.

Editing Your Photos
Touchups can be done through various photo editing softwares, with Adobe Photoshop being the most famous. Product Photography for Amazon especially can be tough to get perfect in the first few shots. There is always room for minor errors in your images.

Editing programs can easily retouch your photos for color-correction, fixing blemishes, and other minor details that can completely transform your images. Editing comes with a learning process of its own, but the basics are pretty streamlined in modern photo editors for an easier & beginner friendly use of the program. 

In conclusion
With a little bit of patience and guidance, you can most definitely mimic the result of a professional Amazon Photography service all by yourself. Image content on Amazon is crucial and you need listing images that can convert customers interested in your product.

This guide could only scrape the surface of this iceberg, as most of it is learnt as you go on this journey. I hope this was helpful to get you started and that you see yourself getting better in no time.