It doesn’t matter if you’re working at a pro level, or you’re doing it for fun…
Toy photography is a worthwhile but tough game!
Great news though…
By the end of this article, you will learn how to make your images look great even on a tiny budget.
If you are new to photography lighting, you’ll quickly get a firm grasp on what lighting equipment will make your toy photos rock.
What’s the best toy photography lighting?
Best Light for Toy Photography: LitraTorch 2.0
With it’s 16 LED lights providing 5700k light temperature, this daylight temperature light will deliver crisp, natural looking photos. It fits on top of your camera and is rechargeable and ready to go anytime.
In This Article
Best Lighting for Toy Photography
- Best light for toy photography: LitraTorch 2.0
- Runner Up: Lume Cube 2.0
- Best bang for the buck: Aputure Amaran AL-M9
- Best cheap toy photography light: ULANZI VL49
- Best Lighting kit for toy photography: Lume Cube 2.0 – 22-Piece Professional Lighting Kit
- Best Toy Photography Light Box: Neewer 32×32
- Best Portable Light box: Foldio3
- Best ring light for toy photography: IVISII Ring Light
- Best ring light for toy photography -on camera-: Neewer 48 Macro LED Ring
- Best LED Panel Light for toy photography: Aputure Amaran AL-MX
Best Lighting for Toy Photography
| Editor’s PickBrand | |
| Best light for toy photography | LitraTorch 2.0 |
| Runner Up | Lume Cube 2.0 |
| Best bang for the buck | Aputure Amaran AL-M9 |
| Best cheap | ULANZI VL49 |
| Best Lighting kit for toy photography | Lume Cube 2.0 – 22-Piece Professional Lighting Kit |
| Best Toy Photography Light Box | Neewer 32×32 |
| Best Portable Light box | Foldio3 |
| Best ring light for toy photography | IVISII Ring Light |
| Best ring light for toy photography | Neewer 48 Macro LED Ring |
| Best LED Panel Light for toy photography | Aputure Amaran AL-MX |
Top Pick: LitraTorch 2.0
With it’s 16 LED lights providing 5700k light temperature, this daylight temperature light will deliver crisp, natural looking photos. It fits on top of your camera and is rechargeable and ready to go anytime.
Imagine being able to take studio quality lighting with you, anywhere you go. Oh, it even fits into your pocket. Oh… and it’s also under $90! What’s the catch? There is no catch.
What is the best toy photography light?
The LitraTorch 2.0 is a small, rugged light that delivers 5700k lighting temperature for natural daylight and flicker free lighting for toy photography. With the LitraTorch 2.0, your photos will look crisp, clean and eye catching.
Quoted as the worlds most versatile adventure photo and video light, the LitraTorch 2.0 is small, rugged and ready to go.
In most instances of your toy photography, you probably won’t be putting the light through any risk of peril. But… it’s ready if that does happen!
The body of this light is made from aluminium which is both lightweight and durable. This means you won’t need to worry about breaking this light, especially during periods of heavy use. It’s rugged and road ready.
It’s very small, coming in at 1.5” x 1.5” in size and it will sit on top of your camera in a very non-intrusive manner. It’s also super light weight at just 90g. No more carrying heavy lighting rigs to shoot your toy photos.
You will also benefit from it’s USB charging facility. You can charge it anywhere from a USB port and it’s ready to go again. It’s even waterproof so if you ever shoot any underwater toys, you’re covered for up to 10m/32ft.
Key Features of the LitraTorch 2.0
- 16 LED bulbss
- Beam Angle: 70°
- Micro USB rechargeable
- Color Temperature: 5700k
- Lightweight aluminium body – 3.17oz/90g
- Brightness Adjusted with 13 steps to 100%
- Mount Type: 1/4″-20 Female and Magnetic
- Three Lumen settings – 100, 450 and 800 Lumens
Runner Up Lightning for toy photography: Lume Cube 2.0
With it’s wirelessly controlled Bluetooth app, the Lume Cube 2.0 is a portable and versatile addition to your lighting setup.
It’s hard to believe how much the Lume Cube 2.0 can offer you when you see the price. Coming in at under $90 but with a spec-list to rival the big hitters. If you are looking for a portable, affordable solution for all your toy photography needs, check this out.
You get balanced daylight style lighting at 5600K with adjustable brightness levels via the onboard controls. You can adjust the brightness in 10% increments to nail that perfect daylight glow to your photos.
If you want to tweak it even further, the Lumb Cube 2.0 also has a wireless Bluetooth connection with an app to control the unit. The app allows you to adjust brightness, light mode, flash duration and a lot more.
It runs off an internal, rechargeable battery with a USB-C connection. You get 1.5 hours continuous run time off full brightness mode and 3 hours at half brightness. Plenty of time to get all the shots you need.
Even though it’s small, it also comes with a pair of lighting gels. One to diffuse white light and another to warm up the colour temperature. These both slide into the light casing which sits on top of your camera on the ¼” 20 thread mount.
At 1.6” tall, this light is small and mighty and ready to travel.
Key Features of the Lume Cube 2.0
- Waterproof to 30 feet
- USB-C Recharge Port
- Diffused beam angle of 80º
- Bluetooth-Controlled with App
- Color Temperature: 5600K (Day Balanced)
- Control brightness in 10% increments via manual controls
- Modification Frame, Warming Gel, Softening Diffuser
- Bluetooth-Controlled with App
- 1.5 hours of run time on full brightness. 3+ hours of run time on half brightness.
Best bang for the buck: Aputure Amaran AL-M9
If you have a small budget, you don’t have to compromise on quality. The AL-M9 has all the bang for your buck you could need.
The pricing of this unit might make you do a double take. It’s very affordable, but it still delivers the goods. For your relatively small investment you get a mini LED light that is ready for whatever you can throw at it which makes it the best value toy photography light.
It has a very high CRI and TLCI rating, at 95+. That means it delivers exceptionally high quality lighting. The lighting is pristine, natural and clear. This works great for both photos and videos.
The AL-M9 has 9 adjustable power levels, controlled with the dimmer switch. You can conveniently adjust the brightness of the LEDs to suit the subject of the image.
If you work on long shoots, the battery life will please you. It offers 1.5 hours use on full brightness, but an astonishing 13 hours on minimum brightness. Even if you do run out of juice, you can quickly recharge it with the provided USB cable.
It weighs only 140g and mounts directly to the top of your camera. This lightweight LED light won’t make your camera feel bulky or heavy. It’s light enough to still allow you full freedom of movement during your shoots.
It’s very small too, it measures up at roughly the same size as a credit card, so you won’t be struggling to control it. The lighting from the AL-M9 is very efficient and direct. It will light your subjects perfectly.
If that’s not enough, it also comes with 12 pieces of colored gel filter to really fine tune your lighting experience.
Key Features of the AL-M9
- USB Rechargable
- Lightweight at 140g
- Adjustable Brightness with 9 Steps
- 3 Color temperatures: 3400K, 8800K and 5500K
- Comes with 12 additional pieces of color gel filters.
- Small and Portable – About the size of a standard Credit Card
- Built-in Lithium polymer batteries lasts up to 1.5 hours at 100% and 13 hours at minimum brightness.
Best cheap: ULANZI VL49
Professional, portable lighting solution for under $30 with a 2 hour battery life and multiple lighting options. Oh, and it’s modular.
The best cheap toy photography light is the Ulanzi VL49 comes in at $25.99 which is astonishingly low for a photography light. Don’t let the price put you off. If you are new to the lighting game and you want to find your feet without spending a premium, you might just love this.
The VL49 has a soft but bright lighting style. The light board makes the light appear brighter but without the harsh glare that some bright lights can emit. This means your subject won’t have any unsightly glare in your images.
The 2000mAh on board battery is rechargeable over USB and can give you up to 2 hours use at full brightness and 5 hours at minimum brightness. It might be cheap, but it’s built to last those long shoots.
The 5500K daylight temperature is also dimmable while retaining all the natural colour of the subject. This lights natural look means you spend less time colour grading in post-production.
It’s small, which might put some people off, but here is where it gets really cool. This light can be used as part of a modular system. Three sides of the light have cold shoe inputs. This means you can buy a bunch of these and put them together as one, bigger, modular lighting setup. You can grow your amount of light to suit what you are shooting.
Key Features of the VL49
- USB Rechargable
- Adjustable Brightness with 5 steps
- Natural Daylight Color Temperature 5500K
- Light is bright and natural without harsh glare.
- 2 – 5 hour battery life depending on brightness
- Can be used as part of a larger modular system by connecting other VL49 units to one of the three cold shoe mounts.
Best Lighting kit for toy photography: Lume Cube 2.0 – 22-Piece Professional Lighting Kit
If you are totally new to lighting, a kit would help you get started. The Lume Cube 2.0 kit comes with everything you need to get things started.
Sometimes it’s really hard to know what you should invest money in when it comes to lighting. It can be a rabbit hole from which most people never emerge. You could take the headache out of getting your first big rig together by checking out a kit. The best lighting kit for toy photography is the Lime Cube 2.0 22 piece kit.
This 22 Piece kit from Lume Cube is small, portable and lightweight. But it also comes with everything you need to make your toy photography look awesome.
In this handy kit you get a pair of Lume Cube 2.0 lights, great for multi angle lighting to create different highlights and shadows on your subject. Both the lights have adjustable brightness levels and can both be controlled over Bluetooth with the phone app.
The lights at both balanced and output 5600K daylight temperature lighting for that perfect, natural look to your images. They have a high Color Rendering Index which means they won’t change the appearance of the image color.
Included with these lights is every gel diffuser from the range, in various colours. This is great for tweaking the ambient light temperature if the plain white light is not working for you.
All this is housed neatly in a zip up carry case which you can just grab and go whenever you need to get on the road for a shoot.
You can mount the Lume Cube directly to your camera, but when working with multiple angles of lighting, it would work better to mount them to stands so you can achieve the optimum positioning.
Key Features of the Lume Cube 22-Piece Kit
- Waterproof to 30 feet/10 meters
- Comes houses in a zip up carry case
- Comes with a pair of Lume Cube 2.0 lights
- High Color Reproduction Index level – 95+
- Balanced 5600K Daylight Colour Temperature
- Control brightness in 10% increments via manual controls
Best Toy Photography Light Box: Neewer 32×32
Affordable and portable light box for any toy photographers who want great close ups on their subject.
If you want to take light diffusion to a new level, a light box might just be the tool for you. The best toy photography light box is the Neewer 32×32. This 32×32 inch light box is portable and practical. The front removes, and you place your subject inside.
The sides of this box are made from translucent light diffusing nylon. This means your bright studio lights can be placed close by for maximum brightness, and the light box removes the harshness.
The ability to close light a subject from so many angles without glare means that you can also get shadowless photos if you need them.
You can even keep the front panel of the unit attached so your subject is completed enclosed. There is a small slit for the camera lens to be placed through on the front panel.
It comes with four different colour backgrounds. White, black, red and blue. Each of the background colours will make your items stand out in different, awesome looking ways.
The light box even folds down into a handy carry bag, so if you’re on the move, or you just want to free up space in your workspace, you can fold it down and pack it away in seconds. It all fits into a handy bag with a shoulder strap.
Key Features of the Neewer 32×32 Light Cube
- Small and portable 32×32 inch/80×80 cm
- Made from translucent light diffusing white nylon fabric,
- Detachable front door cover with slit for camera lens
- 4 Background cloth colors (Blue, white, red and black)
- Large removable front panel to allow for easy image shooting.
- Comes with a custom carry case with shoulder straps for easy transport.
Best Portable Light box for toy photography: Foldio3
We’ve already look at the best light box for this, but what about toy photographers that need to move around?
Check out the Foldio3, this is the best portable light box for toy photography.
You might have experienced the despair of many photographers on the move, the hassle of carrying their lights, diffusers and light boxes everywhere they go. But, what if you didn’t have to? Imagine being able to pick up one item that covers all the bases.
The Foldio3 is a portable light box that has it’s own built in LED lighting. It folds flat for ultimate portability and it only takes 10 seconds to totally assemble the unit and make it ready to go.
The Foldio3 is a 25” light box, it’s big enough for those larger items you might need to shoot. Mounted in the top of the unit is a triple LED lighting system. This means you won’t need to carry your big lights anywhere.
This inbuilt lighting system has a dimmer to perfectly light your subject and it gives out 5700K Daylight temperature lighting. It also has a built in diffuser to remove any unsightly glare from shiny surfaces.
Need to shoot on a black background? No problem. You also get a black backdrop that simply attaches to the bottom of the light box and rolls up into place to give you a perfect black background with no reflection.
It takes a quoted 10 seconds to assemble the unit fully and a further 3 seconds to add the backdrop. That means within 13 seconds, you can be up and running ready to shoot some killer images.
Key Features of the Foldio3
- Built in Triple LED Lighting System
- 5700K Daylight style temperature
- Comes with 2 backdrops (White and Black)
- Built in light diffuser for softening the light
- Magnetic Structure takes 10 seconds to assemble
- Dimmable lighting system for perfect image lighting
- Size(opened) : 25” x 25” x 22” (62.5 x 64 x 55 cm) / Size(folded) : 25” x 15” x 2.6” (62.5 x 39 x 6.5 cm)
Best ring light for toy photography -off camera-: IVISII Ring Light
There are some settings where a ring light is a better option, and when you need the best ring light for tattoos, the IVISII is your go-to choice.
Sometimes as a photographer you just want to light the whole scene. Maybe the idea of a ring light mounted to the front of the lens isn’t quite what you’re looking for. If that’s the case, then maybe a larger scale ring light would be the thing you need.
For a stand alone light, the IVISII Ring Light is the best off camera ring light for your toy photography.
This 19 inch, stand mounted ring light from IVISII is adaptable to a range of uses. You get an adjustable colour temperature from a warm 3000K up to a clear daylight looking 5800K.
With this being LED, you get maximum brightness without the glare or eye strain that traditional large bulbs would give you. It also means it’s much friendlier on your electricity consumption. LED’s use very little energy to power and they give off virtually no heat.
There are 240 LED bulbs around the 19” ring, with a lifespan of approximately 50,000 hours each. It’s unlikely you’ll be replacing any of them anytime soon.
The LCD screen shows the brightness and color temperature readings and allows you to adjust the brightness from 100% down to 1%. If you think that’s pretty cool, it’s also wireless.
It has a built-in 2.4GHz wireless system to allow you to use the wireless remote to adjust the levels from a position away from the light. This means you don’t have to rush back and forth to the light between test shots. You can adjust everything wirelessly.
Key Features of the IVISII Ring Light
- 19″ LED ring light with 240 LED Bulbs
- 50000 hour lifespan on LED Bulbs
- 3000K-5800K adjustable color temperature
- Brightness can be changed from 1% to 100%.
- LCD display shows clear brightness and color temperature readings
- Built-in 2.4ghz Receiver for Wireless adjustment from remote
Best ring light for toy photography -on camera-: Neewer 48 Macro LED Ring
This great ring light mounts to the end of your camera lens for up close and personal lighting. Perfect for close shots.
If you want to really get up close and personal with whatever you’re shooting, you may want to consider a ring light for the end of your lens. The Neewer 48 Marco LED Ring is the best camera ring light for your toy photography needs..
Mounting to the end of your lens, this ring of 48 LEDs allows you to light your subject cleanly in very close distance shooting situations.
This ring light is designed to fit most Nikon or Canon brand DSLR cameras, but check your model before buying. It’s listed as fitting the Canon 5D, 60D, 600D and many other well known models. It also fits the Nikon D5000, D3000, D60 and more.
You can set the ring light to provide continuous lighting or semi lighting so you can really dial in the perfect ambience for your shot. The light is rated at 5500K Daylight style.
If you need a range of lighting temperatures, you’ll also find there are 4 translucent filters included. Transparent gives you the standard 5500K lighting, the blue filter gives you 9000K, the yellow gives you 3000K and the white gives you 5000K.
The control panel mounts to your camera’s top mount and contains an LCD display showing you what is selected and the brightness level. With the panel, you can choose from one of the 7 selectable brightness levels.
Key Features of the Neewer 48 Macro
- 48 LED Beads for close lighting
- Battery powered off 4x AA batteries
- Power control with LCD display
- 7 selectable brightness modes
- Includes 4 filters for various color temperatures
- 8 adapter rings to fit the most common Nikon and Canon cameras
Best LED Panel Light for toy photography: Aputure Amaran AL-MX
This LED light panel is great for toy photographers. It has adjustable temperature and brightness levels as well as a booster mode for those hard to light items.
The best LED Panel Light for toy photography is the Aputure Amaram AL-MX.
This is a powerful, powerful light. You’d be hard pressed to find anything in this size category that has this much power under the hood.
Adjustable color temperature from a very warm 2800K up to a moderately cool 6500K, just on the cooler side of daylight. This makes the AL-MX very versatile for all sorts of shooting applications.
You might easily think that something with this much power would be pretty big. The AL-MX is slightly bigger than a credit card and weighs just 278g.
The casing is made from aircraft-grade aluminium and is designed with a very efficient heat management system. LED lighting is typically lower heat anyway, but this ensures the light keeps cool and at optimum working temperature.
If the sheer power of this unit isn’t enough, it even has a Booster mode which unleashes a further 30% of the units brightness for 60 second bursts at a time.
This is USB chargeable too, via the USB-C port on the unit. When fully charged you get an average use time of 1 hour on full brightness or 4 hours on reduced brightness. The boost mode will eat into your battery but if you have a USB port nearby, you need not fear.
You can even mount it to your camera, or a stand with the cold shoe mount that attaches to the bottom. When you’re done, it all packs away into a handy carry case for transport.
Key Features of the AL-MX
- 128 SMD LED bulbs
- Lightweight at 278g.
- Adjustable Color Temperature with 5 steps from 2800-6500K
- Small and portable. It is just larger than a credit card
- Built-in lithium rechargeable battery and USB Type-C charging port
- Aircraft-grade aluminium body and efficient heat management system
Conclusion
If you’re ready to step up your toy photography game and get your shots looking killer, then these lights will help you make the right choice.
If you’re taking your craft seriously and you really want killer images, good lighting will help more than you can imagine. Invest well and invest soon.
As you can see from the lighting options in this article, you don’t have to spend a fortune to make your shots look awesome!