Boring Pictures

I'm finding myself really frustrated by my pictures these days.  It seems that in order to get the colours more accurately represented, I have to go with "flatter" pictures.  Less vivid and sort of blah like the above picture.  Oh it's not a bad picture but it doesn't really have any spark to it.

In the past, I've tried spicing up the background with props and different colours but I often find this to be "busy" and it can sometimes even detract from the beads so generally I tend towards plain old white backgrounds.  But I'm bored with plain old white.  So once again, I've decided to try and work some background design into my pictures.  I've been looking at a lot of packing designs and gift wrapping ideas on Pinterest and trying to get some inspiration.  Here's one of my favourites. 



Nice clean, simple, elegant, fairly neutral so it doesn't overwhelm visually.  Here's my first attempt at this type of background style.

Not perfect but a little more visually interesting than my first picture.  I need to play around with different layers of material and paper and, of course, this would have to be modified to suit the colour of the beads.  The text is a stamp that I bought awhile ago mostly because I really liked the font.  I also got a stamp maker for Christmas so this another area that I will have to explore in terms of design features.  This could easily take over my life.

For gallery type images, I'm trying to add a little texture but still get a really up close image of the beads.  So far, I'm liking this style.

Rustic grey wood with a macro focus on the beads.  You can't really see much about the set except for the bead in the middle but I think it still conveys a fair bit of info about the set.  I'm not sure I'll ever be completely happy with my pictures because I always think the beads look prettier in person but I guess I'll keep trying.

For anyone interested in glass colours, these beads are made with Effetre Light Rose, Rubino D'oro, Light Rose transparent and white with some light and dark grey in the focal beads.