How to Take Photos for eBay or Your Photo Blog
I thought I’d do a post on how to get the best photos you can to make your items most attractive. I see horrible pictures on eBay
all the time. Why don’t people realize how much this affects which items people bid on and which items go for more money?
Next to a decent camera, lighting can make the biggest difference. Scanning is probably the best, but not everyone has the time to scan everything they want to post. A good album to use for demonstration is appropriately named Contrasts, by Erroll Garner.
Both these photos are untouched except for cropping and my retrohound.com logo, which you can’t see because it’s red. The first picture was taken inside under a compact florescant bulb. The second was taken out in bright sunlight, that’s the only difference. However, some photos work better taken in the shade, like a porch, on a sunny day instead of in direct sunlight. For an even starker contrast, let’s look at the back side.
The one taken in the sunlight obviously has blue tinted photos which you would not know if you only saw the one taken inside. Now here’s a look at the Eddie Heywood album I posted yesterday.
Small photos on eBay are a big annoyance. Here I am, trusting you, who I don’t know, to be selling me merchandise, that I can’t see. And my vision is still in the neighborhood of 20/20. If it annoys me enough, I’ll wait for a garage sale. You should at least provide links to larger photos. Yes, I’m aware of people still on dial-up, I’m on dial-up at home myself. There are ways to make the file size smaller however, someone called Knowledge Hound (no relation) has info on resizing pictures. I hope this little lesson has helped. I’ve wanted to do it for no other reason than to use the yellow photos I’ve taken.
6 Responses “How to Take Photos for eBay or Your Photo Blog”
LP Cover Lover
RetroSpace
Never heard of Erroll Garner before.
I agree. I hate looking on ebay or Flickr and seeing albums with a big bright glare from a flash obscuring the cover art. I personally scan my album covers and it doesn’t seem to take any longer than snapping a picture.
Great covers. All wonderful tips for anybody. Hope you had a fantastic 4th. Cheers!
He’s a Jazz pianist, kinda like Eddie Heywood.
Thanks for the tips, I took a BAD pic today and put it on my blog anyway:( But, I am going to tweet this. It is good info
Thanks Heather!