# what is this background material?



## thepixies (Jan 7, 2010)

hi, 

loving this shoot from italian vogue. was just wondering, the background here (see below) seems to be very thick and luscious - and has a beautiful colour, while my backgrounds are all very thin, and tacky.

does anyone know what kind of material this would be? - and where i could search for such?

thanks so much - hope its alright if i just link from here :

http://fashiongonerogue.com/photos/2009/sep/dreamdress3.jpg
http://fashiongonerogue.com/photos/2009/sep/dreamdress13.jpg


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## mJs (Jan 7, 2010)

looks like it could be canvass...


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## KmH (Jan 7, 2010)

mJs said:


> looks like it could be canvass...


Looks like canvas to me too.


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## Big Mike (Jan 7, 2010)

I'll also say it looks like Canvas.

A high quality (thick) canvas background can be pretty expensive...especially a large hand-painted one.  

A photography instructor I had, said she paid a couple thousand dollar for her first backdrop.  But she was still using it, 10 years later.


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## c.cloudwalker (Jan 7, 2010)

Agree with all of the above. I believe it is canvas.

And yes, Big Mike is right that they can get expensive. But then again it would not take much to paint one, like in the photos you linked to, yourself. I used to do my own and save a lot of money. If you're not sure about your painting abilities, give it a try with a smaller one and see what happens.


Edit = Another advantage to painting it yourself is that you can repaint it when you get tired of what you have


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## thepixies (Jan 8, 2010)

ok cool thanks. i was just thinking it had a bit of a 'flow' to it, and i thought canvas was a lot stiffy. was thinking more of a poly canvas blend or something.

so canvas backgrounds are not as stiff as i'm thinking?


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## STOFFEL (Jan 8, 2010)

Thanks! I suggest create a background out of a wire frame and use plaster to hold it together, it's info re the basic issue. For "Are the schools in ABC City overcrowded," the background material would include recent and projected population rates, class size, room size, and conditions in nearby school districts, I just go to my local material shop and buy whatever colour I need .They do variuos widths so I order the length I need.Works out alot cheaper then made backdrops.Hope this helps


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## kkamin (Jan 10, 2010)

I'm not sure what kind of photography you do, whether it is work with models or families or children.  The canvas backdrop looks nice in the pictures but I think a big part of it, is that there are gorgeous models who have had half a dozen stylists working on them for hours standing in front of it.  They could be standing in front of a hanging Lion King bed sheet and it would look good.  Imagine placing a "normal" looking person in front of that background and it won't be that spectacular.  I think it would actually look worse than getting a standard muslin because the canvas they are using isn't seamless and only works because the fashion photograph is about an interplay between textures and quality--the photo shoot itself is part of the aesthetic of the image and you can tell they wanted it too look a little gritty, compared to the clean, flawlessness of the models.  If you had a canvas with stitching running crosswise through it in front of a family portrait, you would have some confused clients.

Personally I dislike fabric backdrops of any kind and think they look terrible 90% of the time.  There are some nice ones out there but they are few and far between, and to have a photographer use one well is ever rarer.  Look at photographs inside magazines (not just fashion magazines, but any magazine where there would be portraits of people, which is any) and count how many fabric backdrops you see.  Very, very few.  Either the portraits are taken on location or in a studio in front of a cyc wall or in a set they built.  I don't understand why fabric is so popular.  Most of the time it looks like a psychedelic hanging bed sheet and smacks of school photos from the 70's.  Plus many photographers are using crop sensor cameras and cannot get the background out of focus, so they look even worse.  Fabric backdrops have there place and I think they are working magically in the Italian Vogue fashion spread.  But as a slapdash, default background, I think people should try a little harder.  I assume we are trying to create art and not glorified DMV portraits.


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## thepixies (Jan 11, 2010)

thanks for that last post. very interesting ideas. and i completely agree.
i guess thats why i was so into that background, because it was used in a different original way. i shoot fashion - so i just liked that the backdrop had a interesting texture and feel to it.


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## Neuner (Jan 13, 2010)

Where can you find various materials like this in large sizes that are seamless?  I would paint / color it myself.


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