Sydney is the largest and most populous city in Australia. Often featured in lists of the world’s most liveable and culturally diverse cities, it is also one of the world’s most expensive. Yet, as a finance hub where many corporations have their headquarters, business is booming, and this makes Sydney one of the top locations for shopping, culture, and entertainment in the province of New South Wales. Retail and manufacturing are two of the city’s largest industries, which makes product photography an important element in a city where the competition between businesses can only be as vast as its market. Often a consumer’s first impression of a product is a photograph displayed in online stores, print advertisements, or physical packaging. This can give a talented product photographer in Sydney not only an important task but also the potential for a very lucrative career.
At Wonderful Machine, product photography means that the photo shows an actual product that a client is promoting. In such a massive marketplace, it was no challenge to find the right professionals to showcase. Here are the 9 best product photographers in Sydney.
Beginning her journey when she got her first camera at age 16, Tanya Zouev is a photographer who lives to capture not just an image, but a moment and a feeling. Already assisting commercial photographers while still in high school, Tanya went to college for photography and spent the next ten years honing many disciplines within it to perfect her craft. This shows not only mastery in multiple specialties, but also in how many ways she approaches product photography. With an intuitive use of color, Tanya’s work ranges from pastels to bright neon tones, centering on the feeling that she wishes to present a product with. For instance, beauty products have an air of calm elegance and match the many diverse skin tones they are designed to accentuate. Home goods, on the other hand, may have more cheery and vibrant colors often bathed in naturalistic light to bring out a mood of warmth and comfort. Her work only gets more varied as one explores it and her personal celebration of the diversity in humanity shows in everything she does. A fantastic asset to Sydney product photography.
Originally from London, Jeremy Hudson began his career specializing in drinks photography. His skill earned him high-profile clients, including Coca-Cola and Canon, as well as recognition in his industry, yet in 2012 his journey had only just begun. Preferring a warmer climate, he moved his family to Sydney. Here he began to embrace a passion for combining traditional methods with cutting-edge technology to bring a futuristic edge to his work. His enthusiasm for working with movement and light is very evident in his product photography. In it, he oscillates between defining an image by closing in on a specific detail of his subject and orchestrating an entire scene around it. In the former, he plays with the futurism that he is so passionate about, and in the latter, he surrounds a product with aspects of the experience of enjoying it. Having honed his craft through food photography as well as drinks, he is well-versed in presenting products in a way that amplifies all things sensory.
Originally from Spain, Andre Martin both moved to Australia and discovered his passion for photography early in life. At 16, he began working at Australian Consolidated Press, honing his skill across many specialties. Andre has been working freelance since the 1990s and has a studio in Artarmon on Sydney’s lower North Shore. With a fantastic quality of work in almost any specialty that would lend itself to commercial advertising, Andre’s product photography is fantastic in every way. What adds to this is his utilization of his diverse expertise in applying a blend of specialties, such as liquid and product photography combining to make an extra enticing ad for a bottled drink. Very adept in using striking, yet complimentary color schemes, Andre always creates a perfect environment to support the products he photographs. Not just definable as a Sydney product photographer, but also a major talent and leader in his field.
Danella Chalmers is an experienced food, interior, and still-life photographer. After completing a Master’s in Photography, she has worked for ten years in Sydney and abroad, not only perfecting the imagery she specializes in, but also the art of collaboration. One look at her website and you’ll see that she values working closely with her clients to customize her work to their vision. This is evident in the diversity of mood, background, and perspective in her product work. Every project seems to have its own personality, and that’s down to Danella’s talent as well as her ability to turn her clients’ intentions into a visual representation. Her dedication to working in tandem with others is also clear in that she has worked on several published cookbooks with professionals in the health and culinary fields as well as the glowing testimonials on her website.
Christopher Morris is a fashion, portrait, and still-life photographer lauded across Australia. Celebrated for his innovation and exhibited in prestigious spaces including the National Portrait Gallery of Australia, Christopher often seeks to explore imagery beyond the traditional to achieve something ageless. While his talents in multiple specialties allow him to blend them seamlessly, he also knows how to use simplicity in his product photography to present his subject in its element. In this act of balance, he will subtly employ his diverse expertise to create, in perhaps one or two images, a thorough experience of using a product. For example, a tearsheet of a facial oil advertisement will show one image of the bottle within a calming setting with aspects of its healthy ingredients surrounding it. Next to it will be another image of the actual oil being poured and, caught in motion, gracefully splashing. With this level of attention to the uniqueness of each product he shoots, Christopher’s work is as varied as it is masterful.
Amanda De Simone typically specializes in fashion and portraiture photography, yet her portfolio also shows strong images in product and still life images related to the beauty accessories associated with her primary fields. Very strong in her use of color and shadows, Amanda often works with pastels and sparse backgrounds to showcase her subjects. Often playing with products artfully balanced and posed with one another, this side of her work becomes a perfect accompaniment to her beauty-focused specialties. A regal and graceful air most suited for beauty products is very strong in her work.
Working professionally since 1986, Ken Friberg is a standout product photographer in Sydney who has made a name for himself as a passionate innovator and collaborator. Well-known for the strong relationships he maintains with clients and other creatives, Ken’s friendliness and dedication are matched only by the diversity of his product photography. In fact, his reputation is someone who takes on the challenge of getting an image that has seldom been attempted and putting in the hours to invent his method of capturing it. Product work that could be in fashion catalogs, online retailers, pharmaceutical websites, and furniture outlets only begins to describe the examples in his vast portfolio. Also known for his versatility, Ken not only plans a photo shoot to every detail but is so prepared that he and his team are able to redesign any aspect quickly and effortlessly. Ready to take on any type or level of product photography, Ken puts his clients first – whether that style has been invented.
Working as a commercial photographer for over 35 years, Chris L. Jones started as an assistant in a London studio until working full-time for pioneering food photographer Anthony Blake. A few years later he was working freelance shooting for magazines in London until relocating to Sydney. Expanding into location and portraiture photography, Chris often has fun combining specialties to make exciting images. His work as a Sydney product photographer is notable for its sense of grace while his exploration of negative space creates an artful image that visually stands out in advertising. Chris also often employs soft colors that instill a sense of calm that is very effective for certain kinds of products.
Principal photographer of Sydney-based Crossfire Photography, Andrew Richardson works worldwide and has operated from his Rushcutters Bay studio since the 1990s. His work excels at product photography designed for the online shopping experience, often using a white background to bring maximum focus and clarity to the subject of his image. Andrew’s work can also get up very close to the product, bringing out detail such as the texture of a brand of makeup or the shine of a brass teapot. This lends itself to the often multi-image presentation of products in online retailers, giving customers different angles and close-ups to give them confidence in their choice. His abilities in portraiture and interior photography add to the many ways Andrew has showcased products across multiple forms of advertising. Plenty of his work lends itself to what we’ll find in a fashion magazine or a clothing catalog just as often as the kind of images we’ll see scrolling through Amazon.
Sydney product photography is a very popular topic and we decided to feature more photographers than usual to match this interest. Coming to the end of this list is exciting because all of these professionals bring something different to this highly sought-after specialty while showing mastery over it. No matter what you are creating or selling, there are photographers on this list that have dedicated their lives to presenting it in their work. In a city as large as Sydney and with a market just as competitive, what better than to have so many brilliant professionals to help make the connections that create sales?
Further Reading
See more product photographers in Sydney on our Find Photographers page.
Learn more about other types of photography on our Specialties page.
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