While there are many commercially available reflectors of all shapes and sizes, it is just as easy to make one yourself. We show you how to make a three-faced reflector for bouncing light back onto your subject Before you startĪ reflector is one of the most useful tools a photographer can use, particularly when shooting portrait images. You still have to be careful with handling and storage, but its a way more durable surface than plastic.A little reflected light can make all the difference to your portraits. I too tried acrylic and I was lucky if it lasted a couple shoots. That's the proper way to make a sheet of black glass that will last for years. The untaped side will be the side always placed away from camera (and will serve as a seamless horizon when you light the background correctly). Tape off 3 sides of it with black gaffer tape for handling. Weigh down the plywood with bricks while it drys. Then cut a 3/8ths sheet of plywood to the size of the glass and affix to the liquid nails. Then paint the painted side with primer, then apply adhesive (liquid nails) to the primer. Paint one side of the glass with flat black paint, preferably one with built in primer. I use 36"x36" for travel/location shoots, and a full 48"x48" piece for my studio. Get yourself a piece of 1/4" glass from the glass store. You'll spend way less in the long run, and in the short run (while you're in the process of figuring out what I've already stated), you'll save yourself a ton of retouching time, taking out every little scratch from handling, and each product you place on the surface. Always use real glass if this is the type of photography you do. Its too soft and will scratch if you even look at it wrong. Most importantly, I would not recommend plexi or acrylic for this type of work at all. That's a whole thing to dive into though. The beauty of this is that you can create any tone, or gradation you want (even to pure white) by reflecting a panel in back of the setup and shining a light onto said panel. With all due respect, you're not even scratching the surface of this technique. The f/16 lens aperture also made sure the background would be black. For the portrait (#2), instead of taking the time to set up the velvet background, I placed the table on which the glass was supported far enough away from the wall in my basement studio so the light fall-off guaranteed a dark background. I wanted all of the attention on the subject without any diversion to elements, or lighting, behind the musical instrument. When I photographed the white violin (I bought a cheap violin at a pawn shop and painted it white for this shot) (#1), I used a black velvet background. Like any indoor setup, you can do a variety of things with the background. Hold it by the edges or wear soft gloves. Black acrylic glass shows fingerprints, too, so handle it with care. Even though imperfections can be handled in processing, you don’t want to spend unnecessary time cleaning up scratches and dirt. It’s very important to keep the surface clean. You can see in figure A that this gives you a large enough area to use it for many subjects. The piece I bought was half of a sheet-4x4 ft by 1/8” thick-and I paid $50 for it. Therefore, you don’t want to buy a very large piece if you intend to shoot small subjects like flowers. Plastic is a petroleum product, and the industry has had price increases every year for the past three years. The size of the piece you use depends on the space you have available and the subject matter being photographed. It’s a wonder prop because it adds an elegant quality to the photographs of many different types of subjects, from people to glassware to flowers. Studio photographers have used black acrylic glass to create subtle reflections in product shots and portraits for many years.
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