help with black backdrops please!

[ciprian]

I'm looking to buy a black background,I need one soon so I don't have time to

order anything online,I was thinking to go to a fabric store and buy some black

fabric .Is there any particular fabric I should look for?I want a black fabric

that doesn't reflect light .

Any ideas.

Thank you.

[j_yabrow1]

The best black background material I've used is high-quality black velvet. I used it to back

fine-art paintings for jury slides. It's expensive, but I've shined 2 700-watt halogens on it

and the resulting slides were jet-black (outside the paintings), with absolutely no reflection.

Call around some local fabric and craft stores, someone should have it.

 

Good Luck!

[Matt Laur]

How large are you talking about? 10x20 feet for a group sitting, or something small for a product shot? Just about the only black fabric that really traps light is real velvet... and it's very expensive, and very heavy (how will you be holding things up?).

 

You can go with black muslin, and just do what you can do move it farther behind your subject to help avoid catching light.

[terran_melconian]

Velvet is the way to go. You can try to go to bargain fabric stores and get remnants for $3-$5/yard.

 

When using it, pay attention to orientation; velvet has a "nap" or direction of the fibers and reflects light more at some angles than others.

[gary evans]

If you're looking to save some money, give fleece a shot. Won't last as long as the velvet, and can be a little lint-prone, but best bang for the buck, I'd say...

[davemoss]

just regular black cotton material works good too for head shots. muslin can be died any color, and is fairly cheap. velvet is expensive. i have found that if using an umbrella for the key light, you'd practically need a black hole for a black background with all the spill. with a softbox, you can get less spill, and get away with the muslin, or cotton.

[mike_earussi1]

I use a black cotton backdrop that I picked up at a material store (110" x 12') for around $40. It does have some reflectivity so I have to be careful about stray light falling on it and have to further darken it in Photoshop, but it works well for the price. But if you only need a small piece then perhaps velvet or felt would be better.

[ciprian]

Thank you all,I went to a photo store today and I got a huge roll of seamless black photo paper for 50 $(4x12m ),a bit reflective but I guess good enough 4 right now.

Thank you.

[russ_britt3]

Move subject away from background and don`t light the background and it will darken it. I have used strong light on a black background and it turned light blue in the photos. You can use a white background with no light and get black if no light from the fill or main/ ambient hits it, it will regester as black.