Setting Up A Studio for Pianos

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anmut

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Hello all - I'm happy to have found this forum and I'm about to use my first post to bombard you with some questions. Here's a little background - I work for a piano store and we are finally going to setup a studio for our piano photos. Previously I have used our showroom floor for the "studio" and the nasty overhead lighting for lighting. I'm shooting with a Nikon D3000 and, up until now, have been using Photoshop for A LOT of touch up on the reflections that the floor, walls and other pianos create.

Now I have available to me a large open space that I can hang a roll of paper from and setup some lights and get the pictures done right. So initial questions I have:

1) I'm going to take 3/4 shots of the pianos on a seamless white paper. Lets say on the largest pianos we would photograph I have 9ft diag. from corner to corner - what is the correct width of paper I should have for my backdrop?

2) I am going to want to keep the amount of ambient light in the large room where my studio is very dark, correct?

3) Where should I start to look for lighting and light shades? Most of the pianos are high-polish and black in color, which means it's like taking a photo of a mirror for the most part.

4) How far from the back drop should the pianos be placed so it's not casting shadow? Should I light from the sides to help avoid this issue?

5) What is a reputable store to start buying equipment from?

Thank you in advance for the help - any suggestions please keep in mind that my boss wants this done "as cheap as possible" - however just casually browsing some equipment sites I can see that is going to be hard to do.
 
Wow..."I" would want an 18 to 20 foot wide backdrop,myself, just for the freedom it would allow me...and I would want a good, clean overhead panel of roughly 12 x 12 feet with three flash heads spaced across it for even lighting and a clean, simple-to-adjust reflection. In terms of silks, frames, and grip equipment,m I can see this being a $3,000 set-up easily. Plus, I'd want a bunch of other studio lighting and grip stuff that I already have...

I dunno...there's more than one way to remove the epidermal layer from a feline...

Some serious tutoring, I think, would be very helpful. Depending on just "how good" the results need to be, this could be done half-arsedly...or maybe third-arsedly even...or you could go full-out "right". I think you need to hire a professional who can provide a consultation, in-person, and an equipment purchase list and suggested S.O.P. list for your company. This idea that this can be done cheaply (your boss's idea) is at odds with my experience in studio and small-product photography; this is an area where SKILL, experience, and KNOWLEDGE counts a hell of a lot, as well as having the right stuff to, one way or another, get the job done. It could be done with continuous lights and homemade panels and fabric-store silks....BUT...the shooter needs to know "how to do it"...
 
First of all, have you actually looked into whether it might not be cheaper to have someone come into the store and shoot these for you? By the time you buy the gear, move things around, set up... that's a lot of money and man-hours.

As to your questions:

1. Paper width is going to depend on how far back from the subject you are. Seamless normally comes in 9' (actually 107") rolls, so you could try overlapping 2-3 OR buying a white muslin which can be had up 25' wide.

2. If you're using strobes, ambient light will have no effect, keep it as bright as you need to.

3. Start with the book Light, Science, Magic! Pianos (or any shiny/reflective surface) can be difficult to light well, and there's no small amount of skill in getting right.

4. I would want the piano at least 10' in front of the background. Light positioning is going to depend on a number of factors, including reflectivity, light intensity, modifiers, shadows, etc.

5. B&H and Adorama are both well regarded stores with large-mail order catalogues which can supply everything you would even need.

As I mentioned and you've noticed, doing this well and cheaply are mutually exclusive. It's going to take a lot of of practice to get it right, and a bit of money too. If I were doing this on a budget, I would look at Elinchrom D lights (x4), and large, double-diffusion soft-boxes. I would expect to spend $2-3K.
 
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I would look at building some simple sets for the pianos, rather then trying for a white seamless background. The amount of space required is simply enormous, to play the white seamless game, and you're going to spend the rest of your life chasing reflections.

This is basically a (slightly) small version of shooting cars, and that's a niche in and of itself, and an expensive and technical one.
 
First - thank you to everyone for their responses - I appreciate you guys taking time to pretty much reaffirm what I already knew: there just isn't any way to do this on the cheap.

A few points that I had previously brought up to my boss that have already been dismissed have been 1) hiring someone to do a couple pianos just to get a feel on how to do it correctly and 2) having to spend a minimum amount of money just for the right lighting equipment.

So now I have to brainstorm some new ideas. Maybe I'll have to build a temp set. I recently found the attached photo on another website and, besides the exit sign in the top background, I thought it looked fairly nice for a homemade setup.@!
> Sorry! Forum FAQ's prohibit use from posting photos we don't own exclusive copyright to, unless we include permission from the copyright owner. <

I'd like to go with a non-strobe setup with just some lights that don't have harsh beams. Would I be better off with umbrellas casting the light back or using a sheet in front of lights to diffuse them.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
anmut said:
I'd like to go with a non-strobe setup with just some lights that don't have harsh beams. Would I be better off with umbrellas casting the light back or using a sheet in front of lights to diffuse them.
Click to expand...

I think if you just select a corner of the showroom, and either decorate it or paint it to your liking (the owner's liking) and then set up more or less "permanent" lighting in that area, you could fiddle with the arrangement until it looks "right". Or at least acceptable to the boss.
 
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