Question about small studio set up.

[lungovw]

I am getting a room that is 3,5 m x 5,5 m ( 10 x 15 feet) in area with a ceiling 2.7m (9 feet) high. I intend to use it for portraits with strobe lights. Is that too small? I know I have enough room for sitter and camera (4x5 with up to 300 mm) my concern is about controlling the light with soft boxes, umbrellas... which are quite big. I also have a concern about the walls reflecting too much light. Would be an idea to have the walls painted in black? or black curtains?

I would appreciate any advice/considerations on setting it up. Also tips about online sources on the subject could help.

rgds,

Wagner

[Photojeep]

The room is a bit small but with softboxes, it could work. Smallish softboxes. Umbrellas would have too much spill for such a small room. I would also limit your shooting in a room this size to single portraits only.

I would not suggest painting the walls black. In my opinion doing this would make the room seem smaller than it already is. If you are worried about bounce, paint them medium gray. No color cast onto your subjects.

Just my two cents.
Randy

[Frank Petronio]

A smaller room can be really nice for portraits if you take advantage of the natural bounce of white or grey walls, i.e. use it as part of your lighting, don't fight against it.

At the least you might be able to avoid needing a fill light. Invest in some black cards and the grip gear to hold them (Bogen Magic Arms or the like).

[Peter De Smidt]

You might consider using a 20" dish, or similar, with diffusion as your main light. These are much less bulky than a softbox. You could use a sheet or two of black 4x8 ft foamcore when you want a contrastier light. We use sheets that are black on one side and white on the other. They work well for bounce or subtraction. If you use gaffer's tape to tape the long side of two sheets together, you now have a v-flat which'll stand on it's own. Another alternative would be some kind've black fabric/curtain/pull down. My biggest issue with a room that size would be getting the background out of focus enough. You might try mounting fixtures on the walls to hold the background, or even the lights, as stands will crowd up the space.

[Jim Graves]

Interesting link that shows Peter Gowland's original small studio (in his apartment) and at least one lighting set-up. It's where he got his start in glamor photography. His phone number and email address are on the site: http://www.petergowland.com/Studio1.html

[W K Longcor]

One of the finest portrait photgraphers and all around nice guy, Henry Leichner ( I hope I spelled his name correctly) of Rochester NY worked for years in a studio room not any bigger than that. It was in the back of a department store. If my memory is correct ( not always so), he had a big 8x10 studio camera, with a 5x7 reducing back and used speedotron brownline strobes for light. Henry was a true master of lighting. I think most of the time he used the lights "direct" -- without umbrellas or softboxes. He knew how to use the edge of the light beam to get form and roundness. Even though I was never a portrait man myself ( I did product advertising photography) -- I learned more about lighting from Henry than anybody else.:)

[CG]

You can "widen" the room and lessen the need for softboxes etc., by bouncing your lights off the walls.

[Bob Salomon]

Be very careful with the power of the flash units you use in a room that size. You want units that with the reflector that you like will give you the proper DOF so, for instance, the tip of the nose to the base of the ear is sharp in a head and shoulders. You don't want so much light that you need to add neutral density to control it.

[Don Dudenbostel]

I downsized my studio from 6,000 sqft to 1200 sqft nine years ago. I do mainly small product work but occasionally work with models and an occasional exec portrait. My shooting space for portraits is 15x30ft and ten foot ceilings with white walls. I often use black velvet or black felt in rolls to stop stray light. I use black as negative reflectors and it works extremely well. I also use medium soft boxes, large umbrellas, lights with a variety of reflectors from 5 inch to 22 inch with and without a variety of angular coverage grids. Basically I work the same in my small studio that I did when I had a 50x50ftroom with 18ft ceiling shooting room. The practice of good lighting is the same in any size room. I do agree with Bob Solomon that you want to be careful about getting strobes with too much power. I downsized my lighting gear from almost 50,000ws in my old studio to 4-8,000ws in the new. I have Speedotron force 10 lights in the studio and rarely run full power. Often I run in the lower third of power around 300ws.

I have a nice kit of Speedotron lighting for studio and location but sometimes even the minimum power is too much with the Speedo's. I purchased a kit of 5 Alien Bees with three being the lowest power heads and one medium and one high power. I can cut them back to a level where I can shoot my Canon digital at ISO 50 at f1.4 or 1.2 -85mm using a medium softbox within a couple of feet from a face. It's great to be able to control DOF like that. The Aliens B's have constant variable power adjustment which is also very nice. The Force 10's are variable in 1/6 stops steps. Don't under estimate what a little power will do in a small space.

[lungovw]

Thank you all for your thoughts. Very good points indeed, very helpful.

rgds

WL

[Andy Eads]

Lord Anthony Snowden (sp?) published a book of portraits he made in a very small studio in London. I don't remember the title and I'm sure it is long out of print but it might provide a source of inspiration for you.

[mandoman7]

As others have said, you can get by in a small space, and at times, make good use of nearby walls for fill. I had a smallish studio for 10 yrs and was able to outsurvive all my competitors with nicer studios.

The caution I would add to the discusssion is that your shooting skills may also get a little squeezed in small settings. When I did finally get a generous amount of room, I found my light control to be much easier as each light doesn't spill to unwanted areas so much.

I really like to light my background separately from the subject. In a small space, though, the main light will spill onto the background, and there will be times when you really don't want that. In general, each light that you use will be more easily controlled in a larger space. Close together they start to blend together and you'll struggle to get contrast.


Also, its more physical strain to move around light stands and reflectors when the room is filled. If you've got a tabletop setup with several lights, then making small adjustments becomes amazingly tedious, where you have to crawl over this one and then reach under that one to move the product a fraction of an inch. A couple of hours of that can be pretty exhausting.

The model in the attached sample is 5 or 6 ft. in front of the background, and I'm maybe 10ft. in front of her. You may not share my taste, But my point here is that the main light on the left is not spilling onto the background.

So, enjoy the small space, but don't let it define your work.

[jnantz]

i use 1 chimera "medium" and a 42" square larson soffbox in a small
area ... smaller than the space you are getting.

enjoy your new shooting space!

john