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Tim Meisburger
1-Jun-2012, 20:44
I see a lot used in portraits and still lifes, and have seen reference to how easy they are to make with a bed sheet and a can of paint. I'm a fair mechanic, but I'm not really artistic. Can anyone describe how to do this in simple terms? I, and I am sure other, would appreciate it.

Tim

RichardSperry
1-Jun-2012, 21:03
Don't use a bed sheet.

Buy a white muslin 10x20 for about $30 or 40 from Amazon.

You can dye it with Rit dye, for about $6 bucks. Just boil it in a big pot with a cup of salt until the dye is all absorbed. Or tie dye it in a bucket. Or paint it if you like, it gets hard if you do that.

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_2_12?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=white+muslin+backdrop+10x20&sprefix=white+muslin%2Caps%2C512

John Kasaian
1-Jun-2012, 21:05
I read in an old shutterbug it was best to use a seamless painters canvas drop cloth and RIT fabric dyes. IIRC Francis Schulz wrote the article.

cdholden
2-Jun-2012, 08:06
CJBroadbent posted some time back on how he makes his backdrops.
While he uses them in the many still life shots he shares on this forum, I think they would work well for portraits also.

jon.oman
2-Jun-2012, 08:09
I never thought of using Rit dye.....

cjbroadbent
2-Jun-2012, 10:19
Often the problem is wrinkles.
If you are going to roll it up, you'll need Rosco paint and you might as well go for Rosco canvas. No crackle, no wrinkle.

Tight budget? The double bed-sheet thing stapled to a DIY 2x4 stretcher is cheap, wrinkle-less and lasts forever.

My way, after a few years of screw-ups.
Lay a room-size plastic sheet on the floor (to keep it clean). Lay down the frame and staple the bed-sheet. Prepare two buckets of diluted white wall paint. Mix a tube of aniline black into one bucket.
Using a roller on a long handle, start with the white on the right hand bottom corner and work fast up to the centre diagonal. Dip the dirty brush into the black and work down to the middle from the top left corner. Add a few drops of aniline blue to the black bucket and a few red drops to the white bucket. Switch to a big brush on a long handle and blend with broad strokes. Somewhere in the middle you should have a medium grey.
BEFORE IT DRIES, mix some white with plenty of water in a garden plant sprayer. Spry up into the air above the sheet so that the a gentle mist falls from above and deposits onto the wet surface. This gives you a vague aerial perspective. Let it dry flat overnight.
Your light source is always from the left (that's tradition). So the illuminated side of the subject separates from the dark side of the background and the shadow side of the subject separates from the light side of the background (that's also tradition, think of how a statue in a niche works).
If you keep the right side white enough you will only ever need one light source for everything - no hair-light, no accents, no backlight, ever.
Examples here.
(https://picasaweb.google.com/cjbroadbent/Backgrounds?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCMWBhdPhlu-IMA&feat=directlink)

Tim Meisburger
2-Jun-2012, 23:38
Thanks Christopher. I don't quite understand how the process you describe yields the backdrops you have, but I guess the best thing to do is just give it a try, and after that I will at least have more informed questions. I assume you are able to stretch the sheet tight enough that you do not need any support under it when you roll the paint on it?

cjbroadbent
3-Jun-2012, 01:39
Thanks Christopher. I don't quite understand how the process you describe yields the backdrops you have, but I guess the best thing to do is just give it a try, and after that I will at least have more informed questions. I assume you are able to stretch the sheet tight enough that you do not need any support under it when you roll the paint on it?
The sheet sags onto the plastic floor covering while you paint. It dries drum-tight. Try a small artists canvas as a start, to get the hang of raining the mist down onto the wet paint.

John Brady
3-Jun-2012, 05:06
Christopher, I may have told you before but I will say it again. Your work is without equal, it is truly phenomenal! I am a landscape guy, I have never even attempted still life, but I could look at your work all day. And the backdrops, they are a work of art on their own.

Someday I would love to hear your life story, maybe you have shared your photographic career background here before but I don't rember seeing it.

Sorry for all the gushing.

www.timeandlight.com

Frank Petronio
3-Jun-2012, 06:13
I did them with large sponges and grey floor paint back in the day but the CJ Broadbent method is "the way".

Not to discourage you from DIY but if you are lazy you can get a Westcott collapsible like this:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/501230-REG/Westcott_6767_Masterpiece_Collapsible_Reversible_Background.html

As long your subject is not too close and you can get it to fall off out of focus, it looks like a traditional background. It's a bit small and doesn't have the side to side gradation that CJB does. But it works for torsos in office buildings when you need a background. This collapses into a 30" disc, easy to move around and set up, here is an outake with the curved edge on the floor:

74641

But here I am going off-topic... rather, here is some inspiration: http://www.oliphantstudio.com/ you can rent whatever you like.

Ed Bray
3-Jun-2012, 07:07
Christopher, I may have told you before but I will say it again. Your work is without equal, it is truly phenomenal! I am a landscape guy, I have never even attempted still life, but I could look at your work all day. And the backdrops, they are a work of art on their own.

Someday I would love to hear your life story, maybe you have shared your photographic career background here before but I don't rember seeing it.

Sorry for all the gushing.

www.timeandlight.com

Seconded! I looked at Christopher's website after seeing the above quote and the images are very inspirational. Beautifully lit and with great depth. Some of the portraits are truly lovely.

I too would like to find out more about Christopher.

Tim Meisburger
3-Jun-2012, 13:09
Thanks Christopher. I'll pick up a canvas and give that a try. Frank, I am lazy, but the cost of shipping anything here doubles its price, then there is tax...

cjbroadbent
3-Jun-2012, 15:38
John and Ed, Thanks but it's just my day job and over the years I've churned out a good deal of pretty bad stuff which is not on show. These are just the ones that got away. Tim, by the way the black and white shots of the backgrounds are there to show how they change character with filters; there must be a little cool colour in the shadow part and some warm colour in the light part.

pbryld
4-Jun-2012, 01:21
Is using a bed sheet as good as using canvas (which is considerably more expensive)?

cjbroadbent
4-Jun-2012, 01:35
Is using a bed sheet as good as using canvas (which is considerably more expensive)?
The bed sheet has to be kept permanently on a stretcher which takes up a lot of space (unless you do it so well that your wife lets you hang it on the wall). Canvas backgrounds can be rolled and stored in quantity. Sandro Laferla (http://www.sandrolaferlabackdrops.com/Home.html), in New York, is the king of backdrops.

pbryld
4-Jun-2012, 09:12
The bed sheet has to be kept permanently on a stretcher which takes up a lot of space (unless you do it so well that your wife lets you hang it on the wall). Canvas backgrounds can be rolled and stored in quantity. Sandro Laferla (http://www.sandrolaferlabackdrops.com/Home.html), in New York, is the king of backdrops.

Ah, a bed sheet is fine then. If they are half as good as yours, they are simply beautiful pieces of abstract art; and my wi... parents, they would definitely let me hang it on the wall!

Ed Bray
16-Jun-2012, 12:52
John and Ed, Thanks but it's just my day job and over the years I've churned out a good deal of pretty bad stuff which is not on show. These are just the ones that got away. Tim, by the way the black and white shots of the backgrounds are there to show how they change character with filters; there must be a little cool colour in the shadow part and some warm colour in the light part.

Christopher, I have just been reading the Time Life book 'The Studio' first published in 1982 and on page 219 there is a picture of cheeses on a table and I thought, that looks very like Chris Broadbent's work as the image has lovely muted colours, beautifully lit and a lovely feel to the image, but when I looked at the credit, the image was by Francois Gillet, 1978. So what has this to do with you I hear others thinking (because I'm sure you know), the image on the previous page (218) is of a strange conglomoration of a cabbage suspended over a table with the most gaudy mainly purple tablecloth which has a glass of wine and a gold plate with an apple on it, and who was it by? The illustrious Christopher Broadbent, taken in 1980.

alanbutler57
18-Jun-2012, 16:52
Often the problem is wrinkles.
If you are going to roll it up, you'll need Rosco paint and you might as well go for Rosco canvas. No crackle, no wrinkle.

Tight budget? The double bed-sheet thing stapled to a DIY 2x4 stretcher is cheap, wrinkle-less and lasts forever.

My way, after a few years of screw-ups.
Lay a room-size plastic sheet on the floor (to keep it clean). Lay down the frame and staple the bed-sheet. Prepare two buckets of diluted white wall paint. Mix a tube of aniline black into one bucket.
Using a roller on a long handle, start with the white on the right hand bottom corner and work fast up to the centre diagonal. Dip the dirty brush into the black and work down to the middle from the top left corner. Add a few drops of aniline blue to the black bucket and a few red drops to the white bucket. Switch to a big brush on a long handle and blend with broad strokes. Somewhere in the middle you should have a medium grey.
BEFORE IT DRIES, mix some white with plenty of water in a garden plant sprayer. Spry up into the air above the sheet so that the a gentle mist falls from above and deposits onto the wet surface. This gives you a vague aerial perspective. Let it dry flat overnight.
Your light source is always from the left (that's tradition). So the illuminated side of the subject separates from the dark side of the background and the shadow side of the subject separates from the light side of the background (that's also tradition, think of how a statue in a niche works).
If you keep the right side white enough you will only ever need one light source for everything - no hair-light, no accents, no backlight, ever.
Examples here.
(https://picasaweb.google.com/cjbroadbent/Backgrounds?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCMWBhdPhlu-IMA&feat=directlink)

These are gorgeous. If the final results are to be digitized, I wonder if shifting the color palette to cyans would work the same way (thus allowing color to be shifted in post processing without affecting skin tones). Many thanks for a wonderful trade "secret".

Kevin J. Kolosky
25-Jun-2012, 18:00
You can also use a Window Shade. I have a very very fine background painted on a large windowshade by a company called the Backgrounders (now out of business I believe) easy to store and easy to use and transport. Great when you aren't going to be doing large groupls.

zenny
6-Jul-2012, 02:10
Often the problem is wrinkles.
If you are going to roll it up, you'll need Rosco paint and you might as well go for Rosco canvas. No crackle, no wrinkle.

Tight budget? The double bed-sheet thing stapled to a DIY 2x4 stretcher is cheap, wrinkle-less and lasts forever.

My way, after a few years of screw-ups.
Lay a room-size plastic sheet on the floor (to keep it clean). Lay down the frame and staple the bed-sheet. Prepare two buckets of diluted white wall paint. Mix a tube of aniline black into one bucket.
Using a roller on a long handle, start with the white on the right hand bottom corner and work fast up to the centre diagonal. Dip the dirty brush into the black and work down to the middle from the top left corner. Add a few drops of aniline blue to the black bucket and a few red drops to the white bucket. Switch to a big brush on a long handle and blend with broad strokes. Somewhere in the middle you should have a medium grey.
BEFORE IT DRIES, mix some white with plenty of water in a garden plant sprayer. Spry up into the air above the sheet so that the a gentle mist falls from above and deposits onto the wet surface. This gives you a vague aerial perspective. Let it dry flat overnight.
Your light source is always from the left (that's tradition). So the illuminated side of the subject separates from the dark side of the background and the shadow side of the subject separates from the light side of the background (that's also tradition, think of how a statue in a niche works).
If you keep the right side white enough you will only ever need one light source for everything - no hair-light, no accents, no backlight, ever.
Examples here.
(https://picasaweb.google.com/cjbroadbent/Backgrounds?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCMWBhdPhlu-IMA&feat=directlink)

Yep, thanks for useful information.

And I cherished visiting your site (http://www.christopherbroadbent.pro). Or call them "visual therapy"! :-) Some still life pictures look like paintings. How do you achieve such tonality? Just curious.

//zenny

---

Support http://thehumanape.com

mandoman7
6-Jul-2012, 08:35
Mr Broadbent's advice is obviously right on. I would add that Chicago Canvas is a great supplier of muslin or canvas, serving the theater industry in addition to photogs. Also, in addition to the rollers for painting, I would suggest trying sponges and brooms to apply the paint with different textures, after some base coloring has been established. Usually after putting a several coats on the backdrop and then doing some test shots, I would want to make refinements such as darkening a corner and or adding some texture. What I found was that, with each successive layer the background seemed to get more interest and depth. So its good to just start rough and assume that adjustments will be made over time. Good luck!

DrTang
6-Jul-2012, 09:51
[QUOTE=zenny;907392]Yep, thanks for useful information.

And I cherished visiting your site (http://www.christopherbroadbent.pro). ....
---

the backdrops are nice and all...BUT

What is that REALLY COOL wood deal with crank or something on the far right of that studio pix?


oh man.. whatever it is..I want one

cjbroadbent
19-Jul-2012, 03:03
[QUOTE=zenny;907392]...What is that REALLY COOL wood deal with crank or something on the far right of that studio pix?...
It's an old architects's drawing board tipped upright. Here it is, flattened and raised:

Ed, I'm a fan of Francois Gillet. The gaudy tablecloth was a ripoff of Cotan (d.1627) for a mag. I did a bit better in the Time-Life book on Studio Lighting .

DrTang
19-Jul-2012, 10:48
[QUOTE=cjbroadbent;912135][QUOTE=DrTang;907513]
It's an old architects's drawing board tipped upright. Here it is, flattened and raised:

[QUOTE]


oh...that thing rules

Tim Meisburger
12-Aug-2012, 18:01
Well, after a nice vacation (Montevecchia and northern Italy), where I spent as much time as a man with kids can looking at backgrounds in art, I got back and gathered materials and gave it a try. I used a 1 meter square canvas I bought at an office supply store. First I rolled in the diagonals in light and dark, then mixed with a brush. I really liked the look of that, but then I added in red and blue, and liked that less, then tried to mist in dilute white for the aerial effect, and got big drops mixed with the mist (I think spray paint might work better). Here is the first attempt.
78687

And here is the second, which I painted the next day.

78688

Tim Meisburger
12-Aug-2012, 18:07
Here is the second background in black and white.

78691

And here is the third attempt.

78692

As you can see, none look very good, and the third one has a consistent tone that looks almost neutral gray in black and white. I'm going to try again (perhaps later today), but using only black and white, as my very first attempt (which I unfortunately did not photograph) looked good before I added the color.

Any advice is appreciated.

Tim

aluncrockford
18-Aug-2012, 15:06
You have to use a matt paint for best results cheap paint flares, Bristol and rosco are industry standard and they can be diluted and if needed put through a paint gun via a compressor, If memory serves me well they are both pigment based so the colour is a lot richer . It is generally felt that for what you are trying to do gradind from the centre outward helps sits your subject eg lighter in the centre and darkening out . Looking at your background it looks like there is far too much texture you need to blend the tones, it also helps to get the background away from the main subject, this allows you to light your foreground and let the light drift onto the background , generally the subject is light from the left, this puts the shadow on the right and helps hold the picture in the frame and if needed use a dog toothed cutter to help take any extra light away from the left side of the background, this also helps your subject stand out.

Kevin J. Kolosky
23-Aug-2012, 08:06
http://www.modelmayhem.com/po.php?thread_id=259183

Tim Meisburger
23-Aug-2012, 18:31
Interesting thread. I painted the canvas again yesterday with just black and white, and will post a picture later of the new version. I definitely recommend Christopher's advice to start with an art canvas. I have painted that four times now, and while I'm not very good, its quite fun!