There are all kinds of photographers out there, but don’t worry—if you’re looking for professional product photos, you’re in the right place!

With over 20 years of experience, we pride ourselves on delivering the very best images whether you need straight-forward e-commerce photos or artistic brand imagery for large format displays, posters or printed marketing or advertising.

Our process starts with creative ideas flowing back and forth to determine the “essence” of your products. What are the two or three most important things you want your potential customers to know and understand? From there, we set out to create imagery that speaks to that “essence” and communicates the key information that your customers need to make the buying decision.

More than just “pretty pictures”

While there is definitely and “art” to taking great pictures, there’s also science and technical expertise involved. And of course, having the best equipment in the world doesn’t hurt either!

At Illusionary Photo, we shoot with top-of-the-line NIKON cameras, lenses and accessories. People using lesser equipment will always say things like “the equipment doesn’t matter if you have the skills”, but there is also a reason why NIKON is considered the best maker of photographic equipment in the world. It’s the same reason that we ONLY use NIKON.

NIKON D850, D810 and D750

Our workhorse camera body is the D850, a full-featured, full-frame DSLR that shoots at an ridiculous resolution of 47.8MP (more than 4X higher than the latest iPhone and more than twice the resolution of most other professional DSLRs. This is the point where photographers with some of those “other” DSLRs will tell you that “you don’t need that high resolution for photos that you’re just going to use online,” and other things to justify their use of lesser equipment.

Our philosophy is really quite simple: Data storage is cheap, our computers are fast and powerful and why WOULDN’T we shoot at the full capabilities of our equipment? We can always make one of our full-resolution photos smaller—but you can’t make an inferior resolution photo bigger without losing clarity.

Our back up cameras are also full-frame cameras that shoot at 36.7MP (D810) and 24.8MP (D750). Don’t panic. We’ve only had to rely on a back-up camera once in the past 8 years and it was only for a day. But it’s nice to know that should the worst happen, our back-up cameras are just as good (if not better) as the standard equipment most “other” photographers are packing.

What’s else is in our bag?

SPEEDLIGHTS: Even for a standard restaurant shoot, we carry more than we’ll ever need. This includes carrying 4 NIKON SB-5000 speedlights. 4? Really? Yup. These are the newest, most powerful strobes that NIKON has ever made. And making them even more special is the fact that they communicate with the camera using radio waves, not optical triggers like most “other” systems. This means that we can hide and control these strobes remotely without having them be in “line of sight” to the camera. Don’t get us started on the cool effects we can achieve, but let’s just say that that we can light virtually any room, any space, in any situation.

LENSES: We never leave the studio with fewer than 3 lenses, usually 4. And they are all NIKKOR lenses that perform remarkably well in low light conditions (photographers call this “fast glass”). We could have saved thousands of dollars by using lenses from other manufacturers, but that would defeat the purpose of shooting in 47.8 MP, wouldn’t it? Highest resolution cameras require the highest resolution glass to shoot through.

ACCESSORIES: We also never leave the studio without a tripod, light stands, photographic umbrellas, light modifiers, spare batteries and other accessories. All of this equipment makes our bag very heavy, but it also ensures that we’ll be able to accomplish your location shoot under virtually any circumstances in virtually any conditions.

In Studio

Our studio is AWESOME!

This is where we feel most at home. We have a full collection of studio lighting, light stands, modifiers, backgrounds and all of the tricks and accessories necessary to achieve fantastical effects and really amazing imagery that is limited only by our imaginations—and yours.

And since Food Photography is one of our specialties, we also have a fully equipped kitchen with lots of gourmet cookware, tools and accessories.

We consider our studio a “Freethinking Zone” so our imaginations are allowed to soar when we’re here!