I am always amazed at the quality of studio set-up style pictures on this site. Do you have any advice on what to get to set up a basic studio, lighting, backgrounds etc. At the moment I have a cheapy tripod, couple of bits of black paper and basic house lights. Any suggestions?
A very simple light setup I use is some 8 dollar aluminum clamp on work lamps from Home Depot. I use a hundred watt bulb in them as my light source. When using regular household bulbs, set your white balance to the incandescent bulb setting or do a manual set if your cam is capable. Do this to get rid of the yellow tint associated with regular household lights. Backdrops are easy. A piece of non reflective black fabric sold by the yard at either Walmart or a sewing shop. I sometimes use black posterboard too. You can go with either a 1 or 2 light setup depending on the effect you are trying to achieve. I end up using side lighting ( placing the light to left or right of my subject ) alot and reflecting light back onto the subject with a white reflector ( cardboard ) or mirror to fill in shadow areas. All this is pretty cheap and low tech but works great. I use this setup alot even though I do have some photofloodlamp equipment with umbrellas. I have alot of shots in my DA gallery ( link below ) that use the very simple clamp on lite style. Hope this helps..Again this is just some low tech lighting tips that Ive had good results with. :) I cut and pasted this from an earlier post I had did. Hopefully some other people will have some tips too!
Hi Natasha.
Try these and see if your questions are answered.
I use a regular work light stand...double and a single. HomeDepot specials.
500w bulbs, with some clip on lights also to fill in when
needed.
Good luck. Justine
I just bought some home depot lights too( $8. clip-on 100 watt and a twin head 500watt worklight on a stand for $30.). Before that all I had was two little Ikea desk lamps. My backdrop is a piece of posterboard.
Hey Natasha, I will reply to anyone that quotes Proust!!!
Here is my photo.net gallery. All indoor shots use house lighting, 2 desktop gooseneck lamps and GE Reveal 100 watt bulbs...
//www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=250781
Shot in my bathroom studio, loving called Studio 1-11-79. Bathrooms are one huge softbox as long as you use the correct bulbs. All of the indoor shots in that gallery are using everyday house lighting.
Personally I have found 500w lighting way to harsh. That is just a personal taste I guess. LOL.
Any questions about particular shots just email or PM me. Will be happy to answer any questions...
I'd highly suggest checking out our How'd They Do That? section... a lot of users share their low to mid-level lighting setups used for actual DPChallenge entries.
