Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Umbrella Stand and Backdrop

I'm very excited about what the UPS man brought to our house recently! In the Adorama boxes were a light stand, a Westcox 60" umbrella, and the universal umbrella clamp.


On the right side of the photo, you can see the umbrella stand, umbrella, and attached flash.  And in front of the window, directly in front of the camera on the tripod, is the backdrop stand that Doug helped me create.  Basically, we bought  pvc piping, sawed some of it in pieces, drilled holes, bought elbow connectors, and hung a shower curtain on it. Unfortunately, there are some vertical stripes in the shower curtain. It works well enough when I blow out the background in processing. I think I need a few more holes in the pvc piping to have more options for the height, and might try some other kinds of material for the backdrop.

Oh, and the weird little toys on the floor, including the shredded stuffed animals, all belong to Ruby.

I'm slowly working my way through Zach Arias "One Light" DVDs on external flash, and Neil van Niekerk's book, "Off-Camera Flash."

So little time, so much to shoot! (But then, Doug says that too, but about squirrels!)

5 comments:

Maria said...

Oh. My. God!!! Where did you put the furniture? Did you trade them in for the PVC piping?

Now you've done it! Lee wants to put computer "stuff" in the Living Room!

pat said...

What a fun set-up! You are going to be able to do so many things with this---as I can see you have already with those yummy tree peony shots.

And to answer your question--no, I don't spray water; I live in Seattle. It rains almost all the time. I find that raindrops are the best shape...even sprinkler drops don't seem to "hang" the same way.... I know a lot of people use a spray bottle, but I've never had much luck with that.

Barb said...

You are getting so professional! The next thing you know you will be having a special room in your house for your studio. Very nice!

Angela2932 said...

Uh, oh. Actually, Maria, we DO have computer equipment in our living room! If you look closely, you can see one old laptop on a little table. Then there's my "good" laptop near the couch, because the living room really is where I have my "office." Doug has two laptops floating around in there too. And then, of course, there are a few hard drives floating around, and a printer, . . . .

Lee'd be right at home! I guess we've always made our living room "work" for us. I remember the days where we literally had a Little Tykes slide set up in the middle of the room, with big Sesame Street toy boxes, the world's biggest coffee table for Lego building . . . .

But now it's OUR toys :)

Nicki said...

Love the pvc stand and can't wait to see how you like the umbrella set-up (I've been thinking about that for awhile now).