My product photo has a light gray backdrop, not white. What padding color should I choose so the edges do not show?
Use the color at the edge of your own photo, not white. Take the backdrop's color code from near the photo's edge with the color picker tool, paste it into the resizer's 'Background color', then convert with 'Fit inside'. The added bands blend into the backdrop and the seam disappears.
Where the seam comes from
A backdrop that looks white in a home studio comes out light gray or slightly cream in the photo, because of the lighting and camera settings. When the tool adds pure white bands next to it, two different tones meet in a sharp straight line, and it looks like one picture pasted on another. On a white store page, that line can draw more attention than the product.
A 3024 × 4032 portrait phone photo inside a 2000 × 2000 square with 'Fit inside'.
The photo is scaled to 1500 × 2000 and placed 250 px from the left.
So the two added bands are 250 px wide each, on the left and right of the photo, exactly where the difference will show.
Take the color from the right place
- Open the original photo in the Image color picker.
- Click a point of the backdrop close to the edge that will meet the bands, not the middle of the photo. On a portrait photo, sample near the left or right side.
- Copy the HEX color code.
- Open the Image resizer, choose the photo, type the size and choose 'Fit inside'.
- Open the 'Background color' picker, paste the code, and check the preview zoomed in where the two meet.
When one color is not enough
Photo backdrops are rarely one flat color. They may be lighter in the middle and darker toward the edges, or warmer on the side of the lamp. The tool fills the bands with a single color, so if the backdrop changes a lot from the top of the edge to the bottom, a faint difference will remain somewhere. In that case sample from the middle of the edge, which reduces the difference where the eye notices it most.
If the line still shows, consider 'Fill and crop' when the product is centered with enough space around it, so no bands are added at all. The fix with the longest reach is better lighting at your next shoot, so the backdrop comes out closer to white.
Common questions
Does the color shift after saving as JPEG?
Very light tones can move slightly because of compression, but the change is usually far smaller than the gap between gray and white. Check the preview before downloading.
I want white bands on every store photo. What then?
If your platform shows photos on white, it is best for the backdrop itself to be white. The band color should follow each photo's backdrop so no seam appears.