The Best Camera For Toy Photography?

The one you have with you.

I have Sony professional cameras and an iPhone 13 Pro. I have add-on lenses for the iPhone and four lenses for my Sony cameras.

I rarely talk about which camera I used in my behind the scenes descriptions because it rarely matters. But in this photo, it did matter and the iPhone 13 Pro was the best camera for the job, because of it’s size.

I wanted to set up a two-photo comic pane (toy photograph) showing both perspectives of an exchange between the droid and the trooper. In order to get the bottom shot I literally couldn’t have used any other camera but the iPhone camera. I could have gotten the top shot with my Sony but it would have been difficult and I would have had to compromise on the composition.

The bottom shot involved the camera in Macro mode. I wanted to line up the shadow from the trooper’s legs with the shadow from the dead droid’s legs. The space was very tight and only the iPhone would fit.

Another way of putting this is — when someone asks me what’s my favorite camera for toy photography, I say — “It depends.”

In my opinion, it’s much smarter to spend money on action figures, props and sets than worry about a fancy camera. Toy photography can be done with any camera… including the one you have with you.

In case your interested in the rest of the tools I used on this spread…

I made the blaster and smoke effect as well as the B&W Noir film grade in BorisFX Optics 2022.

Platypod and Oben tripod where involved. Profoto C1 and Raya (B&H) 9-Inch LED light were used as light sources.

Remember, toys are joy.