Tutorial: Black BG

Yes, I was inspired by this great anime for the title, but I’m not going to talk about it at all. This time, I want to write some lines to answer this question : “how to have deep black baground for a figure indoor photo shots?”
I think it could be interresting to share what I tried to obtain such backgrounds, and you’ll see, this is very simple and in fact could be summed up in one word : distance.
For the samples below, I took pictures of my latest figure, the Kotobukiya’s Sonsaku Hakufu from IKKI TOUSEN.

Set up

First, here how I set up my stuff.

Most of the time, when I go for photo sessions, I like to be in a full dark room, with no other lights than ones on my desk that I can manage :

number 1 halogen lamp is the one I always use, with my home-made diffuser.
number 2 halogen lamp when I wan’t no shadow effects, or a global light.
and number 3 CFL when I’m not satisfied with my “reflector”.

For almost all pictures that will folow, I’ve only used the number 1 lamp, the diffuser, made according to super rats tutorial, and some white paper as reflectors, supported by a mini tripod design easel (since I found this idea on valho’s blog, I can’t do without). No other lights at all.

Now, like I’ve already said it, the clue is distance. It is possible to have a deep black background with any dark colored paper, from the moment you have enough space between the figure and the background.

Here I used the blue paper on the photo above, I swear!

By the way, if you wonder why there was a kind of CD-box on my desk, I use it to raise the figure, and take this kind of shot :

Lighting

From now, pictures have been taken with a real black paper as background.

Taking picture with only one light source strongly requires the use of a reflector and diffuser. Except if you want to have some contrasted effects, but I think at least the diffuser should be used.

Here what does it look like with none of them :

And now, with the diffuser :

And at last, with white paper as reflector :

Distance is important, since if you’re too close to the background paper, the lamp may light it at the same time as your subject. Like this, for example :

An other funny way to take pictures with black background is to light the figure (or anything else you want to photography) from behind.
An example, with no reflector and no diffuser :

Then I tryed the same thing with the reflector first :

And finally added the diffuser :

Dark Background with a little touch of color

To end with, what I prefer with dark background is when the original color is still visible. That gives a colored shade to the picture, which may avoid to have always the same black background.

For this kind of effect, the only thing to do is play with distance between the figure, the background and the light source.

A last shot, using the number 2 lamp to see the differences :

Some words about the figure

On the box, and the base of this figure, it can be read : “Dragon Destiny”.
WTF!?
I don’t get it… why the hell did they make such a stupid mistake!? This Hakufu is definitly NOT the one designed in Dragon Destiny. How could they get mixed up, this is just the Hakufu from the first IKKI TOUSEN anime. Well, that’s just a detail, but for a true IKKI TOUSEN fan like me, that’s shocking! ^^;

On promotional pictures, she had darker hair, and the magatama was opaque (example)… this is not really the case for mine, but I prefer her that way actually.

Product Information

• Manufactured by Kotobukiya
• completed 1/8 scale pvc figure
• Released in May 2007 in Japan
• List Price of 4,200 JPY

• 
• Tokyo Sushi
• Makuhari Messe
• Haruhi Figures
• Black Rock Shooter Blu-ray
• Tsumugi Kotobuki Figure

• 
• It's never too early
• Playing with fire
• Muse
• Them Crooked Vultures
• Safety in numbers