Home Studio & Light Meter - advice please

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Deleted member 9479

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Hi all.

Ok people, that time has come where the dining room has now been aquired (she'e very understanding) and will be used mainly as a home studio. It does have a large window to use for natural light where required, will be painted mat white all round, I have a pair of Interfit Stellar 300's with the larger 40" square softboxes, and I hope to aquire some telescopic poles to hold backdrops. I alreay have various reflectors and a couple of fluorescent continuous lights too.

I know this all might sound a bit 'sorted' but I have never shot in a studio as such nor done much portrait work yet (just the usual family and friends etc..). I normally do product photography or location stuff so until now have not needed the full use of this room.

My questions are:

(a) Has anyone else built a home studio - any advice and have I missed anyting here.? black curtains.?? different wall colour??

(b) Can anyone recommend a good but not too expensive light meter. (running out of funds as you can see). There seems to me to be too many on the market with such fluctuating price ranges I really don't know which way to turn here.

As always your feedback and coments are appreciated.
 
White is the worse possible colour choice because it will reflect light where it isn't wanted and because of this you will lose control of your lighting.

The best choice is matt black.

Of course, if it's only being used 'mainly' as a studio it may need to stay white, and anyway black is a pretty depressing place to work.

My suggestion, if possible, is to paint the ceiling black and to have black drapes that you can pull round as required. If this isn't practical, perhaps you could get some black cloth that you can place as needed.

Hope this helps
 
I cant offer much advice on the home studio but regarding light meter i would go for the Sekonic L308s. Reasonable price as well
 
I have to agree when using white for studio walls you need to be very careful, evan when using a matte finish. How ever i also agree that black may create a dim place to work in also.

You may want to consider using a grey base for your walls. This may give you a mid way point to start from.
 
I second the L-308S, just got one myself £99, not too expensive and easy to use.

Wall colours... may be a silly idea but couldn't you use different colours on different walls to use as backdrops... yep probably silly

Mel
 
Hi again.

Thanks for the responses so far.

So, are we saying that white walls are not good (unless doing 'high-key' images) but if we had some kind of curtain track and could pull black 'curtains' round the walls, this would be best?

The Sekonic L-308 you all mention - have you used this in a studio condition or mainly outdoors.
 
Boney Boy said:
Hi again.

Thanks for the responses so far.

So, are we saying that white walls are not good (unless doing 'high-key' images) but if we had some kind of curtain track and could pull black 'curtains' round the walls, this would be best?

The Sekonic L-308 you all mention - have you used this in a studio condition or mainly outdoors.
Click to expand...

If by high key you mean a white background, you'll still have problems. The problem is unwanted light bounce from white walls and white ceiling, which stops you from lighting the scene as you wish.

Post above - different coloured walls - this would simply create different colour casts, where light of different colours bounces on to the subject and b****s up the colour.
 
You can pick up ebay bargains occasionally so keep an eye out for meters on there. I just picked up a sekonic L-358 for £115, just a shade over what you'd pay for a L-308 retail.
 
kalibre said:
You can pick up ebay bargains occasionally so keep an eye out for meters on there. I just picked up a sekonic L-358 for £115, just a shade over what you'd pay for a L-308 retail.
Click to expand...


Hi - was this from a ebay store or just a private sale/auction.? If a store, who was it please.
 
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