How to Create Professional Product Photos Without a Photographer (2025 Guide)

The Real Cost of Professional Photography

A decent product photographer in the UK charges anywhere from £300 to £1,500 per shoot. That usually gets you maybe 10-20 final images if you're lucky. Need photos for 50 products? You're looking at £2,500 minimum. For a bootstrapped Shopify store owner, that's just not realistic.

The alternative most people try? DIY smartphone photography. Which can work, but it takes forever to get right, the results are wildly inconsistent, and you'll spend hours watching YouTube tutorials about "three-point lighting" just to end up with photos that look fine. Not great. Just fine.

Traditional DIY Methods: The Smartphone Route

What You'll Need

• Your smartphone (any iPhone from the last 5 years or Android flagship will do)
• Natural light (a window works perfectly)
• A plain background (white poster board costs about £3)
• Maybe a cheap tripod if you're feeling fancy

The Basic Process

Set up near a window. Natural light is your best friend here. Shoot around 10am when the light is soft and even. Place your product on a white surface against your white background. Take photos from multiple angles: front, side, 45-degree angle, top-down.

For editing, Canva's free tier is surprisingly powerful. Photopea is basically free Photoshop in your browser.

The Reality Check

Pros: It's cheap. Really cheap. You can do this for essentially zero pounds.

Cons: Time. So much time. Expect 2-3 hours per product getting everything just right. Lighting changes, shadows appear, background looks slightly cream instead of white. And consistency? Forget about it.

AI Product Photography: The Game Changer

AI product photography works like this: you upload one photo (even a rough one taken on your phone), and artificial intelligence generates multiple professional variations in seconds. Different backgrounds. Different angles. Different lighting setups. All automatically.

The Comparison

Traditional DIY: 2-3 hours per product, 1-2 usable photos, inconsistent results

Professional Photographer: 1-2 weeks from booking to delivery, £500+ per shoot, excellent but expensive

AI Tools (Like ShopShot): 25 seconds per product, 10 professional variations, £40/month unlimited, perfect consistency

Step-by-Step: How to Use AI for Product Photos

1. Take Your Base Photo: Use your smartphone with natural light. Plain background if possible, but even a messy background works because the AI strips it out anyway.
2. Upload to ShopShot: Log in, drag and drop your photo. Takes about 5 seconds.
3. Generate Your Variations: Select what types of images you need: white background for Amazon, lifestyle shot for Instagram, gradient background for Shopify.
4. Download and Deploy: You'll get 10 high-res images ready to upload to your store.

When to Use Each Method

Use DIY Smartphone Photography When: You're testing a brand new product, you're pre-launch and validating demand, your brand specifically calls for authentic "raw" vibes.

Use AI Product Photography When: You're scaling your catalog (10+ products), you need multiple variations for A/B testing, you want consistency across your entire store.

Use a Professional Photographer When: You're doing hero shots for a major campaign, your product is truly high-end luxury (£500+ price point), you're shooting for billboard ads.

Try ShopShot free and generate 10 professional product photos in 25 seconds. 15 free credits, no card required.