Photographic question - togs inside please
 

So we mainly shoot in this apartment, it has a magnolia wall... But this as got a bit grubby and I also think results in creamy looking pics :(

I've convinced the guy to paint it, he doesn't want to do bright White... So togs here is my question, what colour should we paint it ? This would be the wall behind the model... So wondering what works best, if there is anything in particular.

Was thinking sunshine yellow, pale pink or baby blue ??? Anyone give me some help ???

use colors that are not in the skin tone ranges... blues, greens, pastels... I do use reds but no light is kicking off the wall. that's the main thing... kick from the color into the skin. big rooms are okay with bright primary colors but would stick no offensive pastels in the cool colors for the walls of an apt.. personally I like ultra white so I can bounce light... use a 'drape; if you need a different BG or 3 fold screens

Didn't whilst understand your reply, can you dumb it down for me lol what colours would work well ???

I wanted bright White but he won't go for it :(

:thumbsup:thumbsup

That's quite understand not whilst understand lol

I favor white as i can make it shades of gray or colored with gels and lighting.

In my opinion, medium-to-dark blues & greens work best for backgrounds. They are perfect complimentary colors to skintone. White is good color but not for every situation. If a model has pale skin, white is a terrible color. Stay away from pastel colors as a rule. No *soft pinks* or *soft blues* etc. Blues & greens are best :thumbsup

Hmmm... ok now I am really confused, the two people I was hoping would post in here did, BM Bradley and Dean Capture... two guys who's work I rate real high. But here's my problem...

You kind of contradicted each other :Oh crap

BM Bradley said... Quote "use colors that are not in the skin tone ranges... blues, greens, pastels... "

Whilst Dean Capture says "In my opinion, medium-to-dark blues & greens work best for backgrounds"

So unless I am reading it wrong one is saying no blues or greens, the other is saying blues and greens ahhhhhhhhhh !

Also another problem I see is this... we shoot mainly teenie girl next door stuff, so I am not sure dark blue and dark green walls work... I would of thought pinks... but I agree when even I shot against a pink wall it aint come out great...

Sounds as though I am royally fucked :helpme

Hey
 

Hey Jimmy... yeah I wanted white but the guy who's apartment it is wont go for it... I am getting the feeling we're probably best leaving it Magnolia and just giving it a good clean lol...

So if you all had to paint the wall one colour (and not bright white) what colour would it be ? :helpme

soft blue, lighter than baby blue and make sure the paint is flat, not shiny.
green works too, and i have no problem with pastels btw. too much/rich color and to me the b/g becomes too much but it really depends what mood you are creating.

I would stay away from white.

Good answer for good shooters.

TC. This question is going to get a different answer every time.

What's the niche, what's the size of the room, what lighting are you using, etc.

Show some pictures you shoot, then the room then the dimensions and finally how you light. To get a good answer.

Also do you live in the room? Because you might not like what it ends up as.

Go for eggshell if all else fails.

http://www.housetohome.co.uk/imageBank/h/HG0502-44a.jpg

dean and I agree, however he prefers darker colors than I do,a draker coor will be more dramatic while a pastel will allow the COI be the girl

I don't think that you are royally fucked at all. I gave you my opinion based on my experience but my opinion is not everybody's opinion. Others will have their own opinions so you just have to go with whichever one makes the most sense to you. If you paint the wall and don't like the results, paint it again and again until you find something that works for you. You'll probably get more opinions as this thread grows so don't be surprised.

Hey
 

Sorry people was cooking dinner... let me try and follow up on people's comments...

Firstly I am not sure the guy who owns the apartment will paint the wall's time and time again... hence why I want to try and choose the best colour off the bat if possible... As I said I would of done white, but he wont go for that...

The niche we shoot is "teen girl next door" stuff... I will point out I am not the best photographer in the world, not trying to create a perfect 10 picture... just good usable internet images lol...

The majority of the shoot is in the bedroom... it's not a massive room, if I was guessing I would say 10 foot by 10 foot, maybe 12 foot by 12 foot roughly... To the righthand side of the bed the entire wall is a glass window... hope that makes sense, the outside wall is pure glass... so a lot of natural sunlight comes in (when we have sunlight in the UK that is)

I then shoot with 2 elinchrome 600S lights... I bounce one off the ceiling which as a large full body sized soft box on it... I stand next to this light when I shoot (mainly, apart from when I get enegetic and jump around a bit) The light is to the right hand side of centre bounced off the ceiling... The other box is over to the left hand side of the room, set high up shooting down onto the bed, this also has a soft box on it...

I shoot with a Canon Eos 50D... I shoot on Faithful with a custom WB... I do shoot in RAW and JPG, and have recently tweaked images in LightRoom... but only recently lol...

Cant think of anything else... I might do a video on Sunday as I am shooting then, so people can see better lol

Thanks all for the input, much appreciated :thumbsup

BM Bradley
 

Hey BM...

So when you said "use colors that are not in the skin tone ranges... blues, greens, pastels..." you were not saying that blues, greens and pastels were in the skin tone ranges...

I guess me not knowing what colours are in the skin tone range doesnt help... yes I am that much of a newbie ! :helpme

[QUOTE=TrashyContent;18415363
So when you said "use colors that are not in the skin tone ranges... blues, greens, pastels..." you were not saying that blues, greens and pastels were in the skin tone ranges...

[/QUOTE]

http://www.greatorlandodiscounts.com/blue1.jpg

While you are at it, I think you should get a new wardrobe and set of toys for the girls.

Yes...
 

As you still to this date havent told me who you are... I guess I cant say you aint a shooter, cause you may well be, but I am guessing you dont shoot nearly anywhere as much as we do...

I would love for the models to turn up with their own wardrobe, alas this is rarely the case ! very few have a decent modelling bag, hence why we always seem to end up shooting the girls in our stuff...

We have this last week spent around $500 on new wardrobe... over the next couple months we will be adding to that spend. However it's impossible in today's climate to budget for 8-10 new outfits for every shoot we do...

But I take your point, yes a lot of the girls end up being shot in the same outfits... As for toys... not really sure what you mean, again we spent over $350 on new toys just recently... we always make sure the toys are cleaned firstly with a toy cleaner fluid, and then cooked in a dish washer... I guess the same toys come up a bit, usually to the girls always choosing the very small ones lol...

The "best color" is subjective. I like greens, someone else may like blues and someone else may like pink. What is the best color? The best color is the color that gives you what you want. And nobody knows better what you want than you do.

There are millions of pictures on the internet. Search around until you see a picture that looks like the kind of stuff that you want to produce - what color is the background? Paint your wall that color and you should be fine. This doesn't have to be a complicated process.

Good luck -

The main take away point - don't have the wall the same color as the model.

Thanks...
 

Thanks Dean, of course your right there is no right answer and I am probably way over thinking this... I just wanted to check to make sure there were no colours that MUST be avoided... like are famous for causing problems if you like...

My gut feeling is either for a baby pink or a sunshine yellow... that would certainly fit our teen girl next door style we shoot... As the girls wear a lot of pink maybe we should edge towards the yellow...

Sorry it's taken soo much time of peoples time... just wanted to throw open a discussion on it ;) Again thanks to all those who have put in their 2 cents :thumbsup

In a room that size eggshell might not be the best color with UK girls, some will blend into the wall without back lighting.

Pastel blue might be good though.

http://www.art-paints.com/Paints/Air...el-Blue-lg.jpg

Yep...
 

And with our pasty models in the UK that rules out white and the current colour magnolia... probably why coupled with a little over lighting the models disapear into the walls on occassion lol...

I guess also rules out pink as we shoot a lot of pink outfits... even though someone on another board just suggested bubble gum pink, which kind of fits our style I guess lol...

Hey Paul...
 

Yeah that's exactly the problem... people have commented on it !

I do like that Blue... and also the PINK, I will show the guy who's room it is and see what he say's...

Thanks for the input :thumbsup +1 rep

Pale gray if you can't go white.
The Thing is If you can put a good distance between your subject and your background then you can choose the ''tone'' of your backgroung from white to black by controlling how much lite it will receive in comparaison with your subject. Then for colors use filters on your lamps.

Well you are obviously doing something right with what you've got. You are still shooting and still selling, so it's paying the bills.

I haven't looked at your recent stuff to be honest but it was all looking the same to me.

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