2.19.2012

Easy, Inexpensive Photography Set-up

Setting up for a photo session at home can be a pain in the butkiss!
Which window? What time? Sunlight? Cloudy? And at that point you're usually pulling your hair out and thinking that washing the dishes piling up in your sink would just be far preferable!

Here's a very simple set-up that can help you during most daylight hours. It can even be adapted to night time shooting by adding a couple of inexpensive desk lamps and some OTT Lights.


This is more or less what you'll be needing.
- A piece of cardboard sized as you prefer. You can actually have several different sizes to use to bounce light off each other.
- Aluminum Foil
- A clamp. You can get these at any hardware store. They come in different sizes and range in price from 2$-10$
- Tracing Paper or Velum. As many sheets as you like depending on how much light you want to diffuse. Tracing Paper is thinner. Velum would be best if your area is particularity sunny.


A tripod of some kind is essential in getting crisp photos. Today, I used my little Joby table top tripod. What I love about this little guy is his flexibility. You can twist him about to just about any position. You still need to help keep him steady though. I would actually recommend a combination of traditional Tripod with a table top model for close-ups. The traditional tripods are often sturdier and steadier.


Take a sheet or two of Aluminum Foil and wrap it onto your piece of cardboard. Tape is a good idea to help keep it tight.


Take the clamp and put your foil-covered cardboard into it. You can now place it wherever you need to bounce the light without it falling down on you. As you can see, I just ended up needing one sheet of tracing paper, I could have put up as much as 4 though if I really wanted to diffuse the light.

I used my grey background, but you can use any color you like for this set-up. If you're looking for a bright white background, you can try this set-up. My set-up is basically a modification of this one...:)

A note on the table. I wasn't happy with where I was able to place my foil-covered bouncer and so I ended up dragging my dining table to the window...;) It's a good idea to be using a surface that actually surpasses the size of your photography area so you can really fine-tune your lighting.

With this set-up and my little Canon PowerShot ELPH100HS I was able to take these shots. For editing, I just had some small color adjustments because my light was a little on the blue side. There were very little lighting and contrast adjustments.


If you want to check out more awesome tutorials, you can check out my fellow Aspiring Metalsmith teamies' teaching skills!

♥ VCArtisanOriginals – artisanoriginals.blogspot.com
♥ Sylvia Anderson – sylviaanderson.blogspot.com
♥ Metals Addict – www.metalsaddict.com
♥ Lilian Ginebra – girllovesglitter.blogspot.com
♥ Esmeralda – jewelry-by-silverblueberry.blogspot.com
♥ Stacy – formandfunktionaccessories.blogspot.com
♥ Mary Anne Karren – silverpearlmetalworks.wordpress.com
♥ Pennee - allwiredupjewelrydesigns.blogspot.com
♥ Jessica – www.abellablue.com/blog
♥ Elizabeth Brown – resurrectionsilver.blogspot.com

I hope this little setup could help...:)
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