Quick Setup Studio In Garage

[smoke665]

Gathering ideas for a garage studio, capable of quick setup and take down. Have a large 2 car garage in our walkout basement. It stays fairly warm in the winter and cool in summer. High ceiling. Looking for ideas on having everything suspended from the ceiling so that it will fold down/pull down when needed and move out of the way when done. Anyone else that's done this? Starting from scratch, equipment ideas as well.

Edit: purpose would be amateur portrait, mainly children.

 

[tirediron]

Can't say I've done it, but it should be fairly simple. A 107" roll of seamless for the background, a simulated floor (laminate flooring on a 4x8 plywood substrate) and your lights & modifiers. If you want to spend the money you can get ceiling/wall mount background systems, or you can just suspend a dowel and do it by hand.

 

[OGsPhotography]

Im thinking about moving my gear from basement to garage.

Adorama has a tutorial to convert a garage using rollers and clamps and folding arms etc to keep it versatile.

Tripods on wheels would be helpful. Put lots of plugs everywhere first.

 

[Derrel]

I think too much emphasis might be being placed on quick set-up and tear-down...making things one way, based on speed, will force things to remain somewhat static. Being able to move things around at will makes a lot of sense to me, and setting up light stands or boom stands and boom arms is not all "that difficult" nor time consuming.

Agreed, 107" rolls of seamless paper in white, gray, and black are always VERY handy to have. GRAY paper is THE most-useful to begin on, IMO. Next would be white, add the black last. Add some colored gels too, for fun and variety and for colijg entire backdrops!

Light stands are easy to stow, easy to set up, even easier if they are ALWAYS set up and extended. Want castor-based stands? Sure, why not, they roll easily.

I am not sold on the idea of lighting booms mounted to walls...again, leads you into a whole rabbit hole of X must be HERE, and Y must be HERE, and Z must be HERE...and soon you're shooting everything to a pre-set formula.

Bogen Auto Poles are handy for suspending cross-bars for paper or fabric backdrops; check into Timber Topper spring-loaded 2x4 ceiling-to-floor substitutes for the much more costly Auto Pole system. These allow you to MOVE, or to angle, the background at will.

The opening to a garage can create amazing light. Check out the old Garage Glamour site for examples on working in a garage studio, and for the kinds of things garage studio shooting entails. I've shot in garage studios; the SINGLE biggest issue is, normally, the ceiling height, and how that fits in with larger modifiers!

 

[smoke665]

@tirediron I'm one of those "lazy" people, who if something is to much of a hassle to set up/take down, I avoid doing it. I have 12' of clearance in the garage area (built to accommodate a large vehicle). My preference would be to hang everything from the ceiling. Either roll down or hanging from tracks that would pull out and then fold or roll back against the wall. Flooring would be a problem as would need to come up. Carpet is about the only thing that comes to mind that can be rolled and unrolled.

@OGsPhotography My vision would be to mount lights, modifiers, etc. on some type of folding mechanism that would pull down when needed and up when not. Have thought about using tracks and or boom with counter weights that would pivot and hold position.

 

[OGsPhotography]

Good advice Derrel.

Also if you could just build a closet tonput everything away.... easy peasy.

 

[smoke665]

I think too much emphasis might be being placed on quick set-up and tear-down.

My truck doesn't sit outside anymore than necessary, and my wife, will get real ill if her car sits out long LOL

Also if you could just build a closet tonput everything away

While height isn't a problem, floor space is at a premium. Our basement/garage is a walkout, that is finished. Unfortunately there is no floor space to build closet. Might be able to build some type of pull down overhead storage.

 

[tirediron]

@tirediron I'm one of those "lazy" people, who if something is to much of a hassle to set up/take down, I avoid doing it. I have 12' of clearance in the garage area (built to accommodate a large vehicle). My preference would be to hang everything from the ceiling. Either roll down or hanging from tracks that would pull out and then fold or roll back against the wall. Flooring would be a problem as would need to come up. Carpet is about the only thing that comes to mind that can be rolled and unrolled.

@OGsPhotography My vision would be to mount lights, modifiers, etc. on some type of folding mechanism that would pull down when needed and up when not. Have thought about using tracks and or boom with counter weights that would pivot and hold position.

What's your budget? You can get a ceiling-mounted track system that will work a treat, but you're going to be in to it for a few thousand...

 

[smoke665]

What's your budget?

Whatever my wife doesn't find out about LOL All kidding aside though I've looked at a few of the track systems out there and they are as you say expensive. However, I have a pretty decent equipped shop full of metal working and woodworking tools, plus the skills to fabricate most of what I need from a picture. Time I have an abundance of, so that will probably be the route I end up going.

 

[Derrel]

Good video from Adorama, on making a space-efficient studio, using wall-mounted lighting.

 

[smoke665]

@Derrel lot of good information here. I was thinking along the same lines on some of the things he mentioned. My space is similar except it's garage, I could use one side which would give me an 18' x 27' area. I was thinking of hanging tracks similar to that used on old barn doors with curved sections at the corners, from the floor joists above. The tracks would be flat bar with a "V" shaped top edge. Easily built trolleys using "V" groove bearings would hang from the track, allowing them to be removed when needed. Backdrops, would hang from trolleys on the track allowing me to roll it to the ends of the space or along either side. Rather than mount the lights on arms to the wall, I'm looking at hanging "down rods" from trolleys on the track and using an adjustable boom with an adjustable counter weight to mount lights, modifiers, and/or reflector panels. When done fold them up and roll them around on the side next to the wall out of the way.

 

[Derrel]

Two of my favorite light stands are the Manfrotto Heavy Duty Boom Stand, with the 15.5 pound cast iron counterweight and the standard, long, three-section steel pipe boom arm, and also a standard, 13-foot high, 3-section castor-based (wheeled) light stand with whatever kind of light that needs to be put on it. Older light stands, with STEEL columns and steel bases, on wheels (think Photgenic Machine Company) are very easy and fast to use. Also, C-stand light stands (Avenger is one brand, Matthews makes the **original** Century Stand AKA C-stand) are pretty nice, and set up pretty fast, and can handle heavy loads.

I personally do not see the advantage to ceiling mounting of anything, except "permanent" fixtures like background rollers and rolls of paper, or permanent, overhead "Skylighter" type hair lighting units. Background paper rolls on a heavy-duty trolley makes sense to me, but for lights, I really do not understand why anybody would want to have them sprout from the ceiling when heavy-duty boom stands on wheels would be easier and less expensive and more-adaptable and also portable.

The Manfrotto branded heavy-duty boom stand and its steel-piped arm is strong enough that it can also be used as a horizontal background holder in a pinch, with paper or fabric. I really think that conventional floor-mounted stands will be plenty fast to set up and to take down. Store the stands like I do, in tall plastic laundry bins, when not in use. Or in a clean 55 gallon drum with no top.

There is a LOT of studio gear designed to be clamped to PIPES; definitely consider what is already out there as far as ways to mount "stuff", like booms and counterweights, from pipes fitted into scaffolding, or mounted to pipes that either run upwards from the floor, or go across spaces; there are a lot of clamps designed to support "stuff", all based around being mounted on, basically, "pipes" of one type or another.

One of the cheapest "pipes" is....steel pipe, with a "foot" threaded or weld-tacked onto it at the bottom,and then the pipe stuck into a bucket full of cement as the base.

 

[smoke665]

The Manfrotto branded heavy-duty boom stand

That's what I plan on modeling my booms after, though I believe I can fabricate four custom ones for less than the price of one commercial. The main reason for ceiling mount is that everything is off the floor. Moving or adjusting would be easy (one hand) and when done fold it up and roll it around to the side, where it would hang out of the way.