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| Crushed Panne Polyester
Background |
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Crushed Panne Fabric as
Photographic Background
May 27,2002
I was
roaming the isles of a local fabric store looking for some backdrop material
that had some character and didn't cost a fortune when I came across a several
bolts Crushed Panne. My first reaction was that this rich looking stuff was
probably too expensive and would be hard to maintain. I was pleasantly
surprised to find that both of these notions not true.
This very rich
looking, 100% polyester material is manufactured by Rainwood Quality Fabrics
and available at
Hancock Fabric and Crafts stores nationwide. It comes 58"
to 60" wide and cost only $5.00 a yard here in Indiana. It looks like the same
material is available from the
Hancock web site for $4.00 per yard. The price may actually
NOT be the best part of it all. . . after using five colors for the past few
months, I have found that it is almost completely wrinkle free. When not in
use, I store the material folded loosely and stacked on a shelf (okay, more
often on the floor, in the corner of my home studio).
The material has a
random irregular nap that I believe makes it a perfect choice for head and
shoulders shots when you want to convey a look of elegance.
In all shot
shots below, the light setup is the same. The subject is exactly 4 feet from
the backdrop, the main (at half power) and fill (at 1/4 power) lights are at
about 5 feet from the subject. Exposure was at f8. The fabric needs to have
light added at an angle to make the material "come alive", so I used a backdrop
light directly behind the subject with a #40 honeycomb grid at 1/4 power. No
Email about my subject or setup please, the actual topic here is the fabric.
:)
For low key, the black can be lit to give just a little
character near the subject and for high key, it's very easy to completely wash
out the white with a standard 7" reflector on a speedlight. To keep a standard
comparison, the examples below use exactly the same light setup as the ones
above.
Just to give you an idea of how different the material
looks looks with and without a raking light, look at the examples below. The
image on the left uses no background light and looks almost dead. On the right,
a speedlight with a 7" reflector at 1/4 power is raking across the background
from a sharp angle on the right.
So there you have it - it looks good, it's fun, it's
cheap . . . . what more could you want? Well, maybe a wider roll, but I'm still
happy to have these.
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