Backdrops can be fun

Once again, Fake Studio Set Up in the living room of this couple's home. We tacked (OK, the husband tacked) up my black backdrop, and it hung from the ceiling. To the immediate left, a large window over which the white back drop was tacked, to provide a soft light source. Pushed dining room table to the side, so that I have space to back up. My backdrop wasn't long enough to cover floor for sitting on the floor shots. Just so happened that one of them had a large black sweatshirt - we spreadeagled that across the floor.


My black backdrop was actually quite wrinkled, so in photoshop, in a separate layer over the image I painted over the wrinkles using a large, soft black paintbrush. I keep the opacity around 50%, and build layers of blackness, rather than to use a 100% opacity brush. Then went back and used a hard eraser to remove black from where I'd overlapped with the image.

Sometimes I am temped to buy a proper backdrop set up, the scroll of non-wrinkly matte plastic, with a stand (like a projector screen). I would save much time in photoshopping. There are cheap ones, for approximately $100. While I do prefer natural background photography, it is fun to do dramatic shots with backdrops.