Meet Valerie! Plus Tips on Photos!

After last weeks post Meet the family, I thought this week you should meet my model Valerie, I call her Vintage Valerie…lol:) She is a great model and does everything I tell her to.  Although it would be nice to have a live model sometimes….I will save that thought for another post.

After reading Fredrick_Nijm blog post on Tips to insure You are putting Your Best Photo(s) Forward I decided to share with the group how I get my best photos.

First of all I’d like to say it took me quite awhile to learn how to do this. I tried and failed many times, but I kept trying until I got it right.

I used many background colors and textures until I came up with the one I’m currently using now.  I used sheets ,curtains and different fabrics. I decided that a gray paper backdrop for clothing items was the best for me.

I bought a roll of gray paper from an online business. I did not have a stand to put it on so I had to get creative and come up with a way to attach it to the wall…I happened to have 2 wooden curtain rod holders that are in the shape of a U and screwed them to the wall.  I used a piece of PVC pipe to run inside the roll and then place it on the holders and Wha’La!

For the lights that I use I bought open shop light florescent fixtures that have a pull chain and I also use the silver reflector light fixtures with a clamp.  The bulbs I use in the long fluorescent fixtures are the Daylight 5000K wattage and the bulbs I use in the reflector fixtures are 100W florescent bulbs. 

For the stands I used to set the lights on, I had to come up with a way to do that too. Fortunately I had things around the house that I could use. I used one of my husbands quitar stands, ( isn't he sweet!) an old wooden coat rack and a stand that I had made years ago to hang things on. Since my husband is an electrician I used some of his wire to wrap around these to hold them in place.

I had to play around a bit with the distance of where to put the fixtures and also I had to play around with the settings on my camera, this is important too! That in itself will require another post. 

I hope this has helped you some. Oh...by the way I use Picasa photo editing to edit my photos and its FREE.  I know that there are others,but this is the one I learned how to use.

Now that I have my settings right for taking pictures of clothing, I feel that I need to learn more on taking pictures of smaller items…I still do not have that nailed down…I know that probably sounds silly, but it is true. 

I hope to get more tips and tricks from my friends here on Addoway…the place to shop, SHARE, and save!

Have a great day my friends!