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My Top 10 Must-Have Checklist
This checklist outlines the essential items required for seamlessly integrating photography into your practice. By following these recommendations and discovering the right tools, you can elevate the quality of your photographs and begin capturing stunning images immediately.
The checklist includes:
#1 Canon 90D
A great all-around camera for price, features and build quality. The best crop sensor cameras and it offers 4K video too!
#2 Canon MT-26EX-RT Macro Twin Light
Twin flash is the workhorse of everyday photography. It illuminates hard-to-reach areas with ease such as second molars, capturing surgical photos, occlusal shots, etc. This is what I use for all my lab communication for smile design cases. It is truly my preferred lighting. You can do wireless twin flashes, which are lighter, but they eat up batteries pretty fast so I like wired flashes for efficiency.
#3 Black Rubberized Contrasters
From Smile Line USA, these black contrasters don't even compare to the metal counterparts. The construction allows you to bend them into place to fit every clinical situation. The rubber hides all dust and marks that would typically be visible on a metal contraster.
#4 Rechargeable Batteries and Charging Station
I have a charging mount in every room with batteries ready to go at any given time. I can't waste any time looking for batteries so I want batteries always available at my fingertips to make my systems as efficient as possible.
#5 U-Shaped Retractors (this is what I call them at least)
They are self-retracting, active retractors with external handles and U-shaped handle that allows for extra retraction. These are so nice when you or your staff are taking photos by yourself and don't have a set of extra hands.
#6 Small Desk Fan
Having a hard time getting your patient to give you an uninhibited smile? put a fan on their lap, turn it up, and see the magic you will be able to capture!
#7 Adobe Bridge
Taking the photos is one thing but what do you do with them after you are done? Adobe Bridge is a powerful creative asset manager that lets you preview, organize, edit, and publish multiple creative assets quickly and easily. Edit metadata. Add keywords, labels, and ratings to assets. The best part of Bridge? You can download it and the organization feature is completely free which means you can have it on every computer in your office and they will all see the same information that is on your server. You only have to pay for the editing feature and camera raw.
#8 Neewer Photo Studio Strobe Flash Light
And Softbox Lighting Kit: A complete studio setup for a price you can't beat. You will have everything you need to do your artistic photos and portraits with this. If you don't have a studio, don't worry. You can buy some accordion ceiling rails and attach them to your operatory ceiling.
#9 Neewer Light Reflector Light Diffuser
5 5-in-1 1 Collapsible Multi Disc with Bag- A simple, portable accessory that can create endless possibilities when it comes to portrait photography. Bounce light where you need it, create warmth, soften light, create shadows, reduce shadows, you name it!
#10 Glass, Front-Surface, Double-Sided Mirror
You want a glass versus metal mirror because they are harder and much brighter! The best occlusal mirror, in my humble opinion, is the 4XL adult occlusal. The bigger the better!