In this video I create some eye-catching
images using a reflective background.
Hello I'm Gavin Hoey
and you're watching AdoramaTV
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the camera store that's got everything
for us photographers
and once again you join
me in my small home studio.
Now I've got a different kind
of background to work with today.
Normally I like matt backgrounds,
things that don't reflect
light very much.
This couldn't be more different.
This stuff is called Mylar
You get it on rolls.
It’s very popular with
the hydroponics community
and it's one and a half meters wide,
20 meters long,
I've got loads of this stuff.
So much so
that I thought well,
not only will I put
it on the background
but I made a little wooden frame
and I've just stuck some
to the wooden frame as well
and really what
I've made is a nice little
reflective corner.
Now this stuff
isn't like a mirror.
It's full of distortions
and lines and creases
that adds a bit of interest
for me,
hopefully that will create some
interesting pictures.
It certainly is going to be
a challenge to work with,
so let's get some lights set. Let's get
a model in.
Let's get shooting.
So to help me out
with this shoot once again I've
been joined by Beth
who's going to be the model for today.
Now let's talk about lighting
this could be a shot where you think
you need loads of lighting,
but in fact, I’m going to
keep it really simple,
with a single light to begin with.
We may add more as we go through
but the angle of light is important.
Now normally when I'm shooting
a portrait, I'll have my light around
about head height
or just slightly higher,
but in this case,
what I'm going to get
some reflection from the background
and the angle of the light is
going to impact that reflection,
so a shiny surface
is going to give me light
bouncing around in all different
directions, that's going to be great,
but there will be a reflection, let's see
where it goes when I take this shot.
Here we go Beth.
As you can see the
reflection is there
and it's going straight through
the middle of Beth's head,
which might be perfectly okay
but for me,
I really want to get it away
from Beth’s head
and the simple solution
for that, is elevate the light.
Now when you get the light higher
the angle that
the light comes in
is going to hit this
at a different angle.
It's going to bounce away at a different angle.
I'm going to see it differently
from the cameras
point of view,
so it's worth
experimenting with the height
and position of your light
until you find
something that works with your
reflective background.
Okay let's try this one.
So there's still definitely
a reflection in there.
I actually don't mind that
but now it is definitely higher,
up away from Beth's head
and that's where I'm going to leave it.
Now normally when I'm working
in the studio,
I don't worry about what's
behind the camera.
You don't get to see the mess
that is my studio
but in this case
with the shiny background
that's not true
in fact what
you're seeing in the background
here is a reflection of my studio
and if I get myself in the wrong place,
I’m even in the background itself,
so with shiny backgrounds
you must think about what's
behind your camera,
as well as what's in front,
in other words I need to tidy or
simplify my studio.
I've got a really
neat trick for that.
So what I've done is
I've got one of my normal studio
backgrounds
and I've just popped it up
to the side,
so effectively we now have
a three sided box.
Now this isn't going to
be a complete cure
because I may still
see some things that are sort of that
way, but it should at least stop the
reflections from this side,
bouncing into
one of the panels.
Let's take a shot
and see how this looks.
Okay Beth here we go.
Now that works really well, it certainly
cleans up the shot, but it's not
absolutely perfect
and when I look, I can
actually see a small area of red,
now what that is,
it was actually this which
is the tube I'm using
to hold the Mylar material.
It's just bright enough to be
seen in the shot,
so look out for things
that are strong colors
and take them out
of your scene.
Let's just try that once again.
So that looks really good,
it's nice and simple
and yet it lacks
a splash of color
now for color,
I'm going to add that in
using a second light,
in this case it is the new flashpoint
eVolv 200 and I've got a colored gel
on the front.
Now my idea is really simple.
I'm going to point that at my gray
background here,
of course it doesn't
have to be a gray background
it could just be the side
of my studio wall.
It will reflect the color
and that's going
to be seen in these panels.
I'm just going to pop it
into the scene
but what I don't know
is exactly where to point it.
I know I don't want to point
it at Beth
because then she's going
to come out
just really strong blue color.
I'm going to point it
at the background
and hope that it works.
Now this really is
a trial and error.
It's not a perfect
every single time shot
and if you move your camera angle
it’s going to look different as well,
so do bear that in mind,
this really is experimentation
as you shoot.
Right Beth let's give that a whirl,
here we go,
so that works nicely.
I do get that blue pattern
on the opposite wall to the one
I'm lighting
but clearly the wall on the
right hand side,
well that's still a gray color.
What can I do about that?
Well I suppose I could add
in extra lights
that would work,
in this case what I want to do however
is just take the
light I've already got
and move it.
So I'm going to move it
just a tiny amount
it's going to come from,
well here to here,
I'm also going to angle it back so
some of the lights
will hit the lens of the camera,
hopefully that should give me
a nice sort of blue lens flare.
Just fill up this area a little bit.
Let's try it
see how it goes.
Okay Beth, here we go.
So that works really well,
we've got a light up high.
We've got a light color
in the background.
I reckon we're ready to do
the shot so Beth, are you ready?
Okay let's take some pictures
here we go.
Those are really good,
that was superb
however we can mix it up
a little bit in
a couple of different ways.
I could change my position,
although moving
around does have an impact
so I'm going
to be fairly static here.
The other way
I can change it is,
change the color of the gel.
We had a blue gel before.
I'm going to swap to a yellow
or sort of gold color gel,
try and match Beth's outfit
a little bit.
If you're really struggling
with reflections
in your background
or you just want to change
the look and feel of your shot
then change
the angle of the second board
compared to the background.
Here I've got it much tighter
and that means that this side here
whoa, is actually
reflecting this wall rather
than this wall,
now that means I need to
change the light
that's adding the color,
so rather than it shining directly
over to the side,
it's now shining as if this
was a triangle
filling this area with
light and color.
Again experimentation is
the key to getting this right,
so let's take a shot
and see how it looks.
Okay here we go Beth.
Now that looks absolutely
brilliant.
I love that,
so let's take a
few pictures like this
and see how this
changes the look
and feel of our shiny
background sheet.
Amazing brilliant! Okay,
well those are absolutely fabulous
Beth did some brilliant poses there
Looks so good in our little reflective corner
but there is a bit of work
to do in Photoshop
so let's get one of these pictures
into Photoshop
and we'll do some editing
right now.
With the light bouncing around
off the shiny surfaces
and color gels
thrown into the mix.
It’s not surprising
there's always going to be
a bit of Photoshop work to do
to really get the most
out of these images.
Now you might be thinking
I'm going to spend ages
cloning out some of those weird
sort of distortions,
well I actually quite like those
those were part of the background
and therefore I'm going to keep
most of them in the final image
but the color
that's really the thing I want to adjust
let's have a look.
So the color in this shot
is as it came
off the camera
and it worked really well.
This is the yellow gel
but it was the same with the blue gel.
Good looking color here,
good looking color here,
but this area where the light
really was quite strong
and reflecting hard back
into the camera,
it's gone back to white
and this bit I just need to
mist here it just seems
to got a bit gray.
So to add
in the colors
I'm going to do a few things.
First thing is to come over
to the layers panel
and I'm going to click
on the new layer icon
to get a blank new layer
and it's on that layer,
I'm going to add in my own color.
Now my color I'm going to find
by coming over to the
foreground color swatch,
clicking on that
and then clicking inside the image.
I'm actually going to choose
so around here somewhere
but just like that and click okay,
so that's going to add that color as
my foreground color.
That's what I end up
using when I use a tool
like the paint brush tool
so let's use the brush tool
and we'll just brush over here,
like that everywhere
where I want to re-color the image.
Now you're probably looking at
that and thinking
that is very unconvincing
and you know what you're
absolutely right, it really
doesn't look good yet
but the secret was layers.
When you break your images into different
layers, you can start to control each bit
independently.
In this case I can really
fine-tune the color
using layer blending modes.
Now layer blending modes are going
to be found here on the layers panel
where it says “normal”
I can drop this down
and choose any of the others
they're all going to look different.
I mean “overlay”
often looks quite good but
in this case it just looks a little bit
too gold. The one I'm actually going to
use is right down towards the bottom
where it says “color”
which kind of makes
sense because I am playing with the
colors a bit.
I'm also going to change
the opacity just so I can blend
and control how much of the color
I've added is seen
along with the original,
that allows me to get a fairly good blend
between the colors
in their surrounding areas
and the color I've added in.
Now there's always going to be little areas
where I probably want to go and add my
own little bits and pieces in
and with a few extra tweaks
and adjustments there it is.
My final image is completed.
Setting up a reflective background
in my small home studio
was remarkably simple to do
and the results were incredibly unique.
Now if you've enjoyed this
and you want
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please do below,
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I'm Gavin Hoey,
thanks for watching.