# how would you get a black background effect?



## zandman (Jul 29, 2008)

how do you do it like making the background black.
what's the technique to get this effect except using photoshop.
for example, taking a macro shot like a flower and the background would be black? i can't explain it clear enough..
thanks.


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## Moglex (Jul 29, 2008)

The easiest way is to take the shot using flash with the subject as far away from any background as possible. Using a black backdrop will mean the subject can be nearer the background without it (in this case the backdrop) becoming visible.


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## Overread (Jul 29, 2008)

A black or dark background is very important to helping get this effect - I agree with the flash comments - you need light on your subject else the shot will be all dark.
Once you have the shot it really helps if you were shooting in RAW mode - as in RAW editing you can adjust the exposure, contrast and blacks (definatly boost these first) to help attain the black background.

Its called - lowkey shooting (or low-key) if you want to search more -- the opposite - high key - is where you have a white background


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## K_Pugh (Jul 29, 2008)

Yup i can third that notion - flash makes it much much easier, you can get away without a black background if you direct the light properly.


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## Overread (Jul 29, 2008)

Some great examples from Poppy 67 - go through both threads where she outlines the basic process used:

http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=130442
http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=129339


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## JerryPH (Jul 29, 2008)

If you understand how it is done with flashes, you can take a pure white wall and make pitch black.

Light does have a depth of field that can be easily exploited.

http://jerryphpics.blogspot.com/2008/03/3-dof-of-light.html


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## nynfortoo (Jul 29, 2008)

JerryPH said:


> If you understand how it is done with flashes, I can take a pure white wall and make  pitch black.



Just leave the lens cap on, Jerry. You don't have to faff around with flashes then.


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## JerryPH (Jul 29, 2008)

nynfortoo said:


> Just leave the lens cap on, Jerry. You don't have to faff around with flashes then.


 
LMAOOO...hahaha... err... how do you faff?


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## nynfortoo (Jul 29, 2008)

JerryPH said:


> LMAOOO...hahaha... err... how do you faff?



You mess around, but use a British accent


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## Moglex (Jul 29, 2008)

JerryPH said:


> If you understand how it is done with flashes, you can take a pure white wall and make pitch black.


Indeed, you just neeed increase the (distance to wall) to (distance to subject) ratio (where the distances are the distances of the _light source_).


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## JerryPH (Jul 29, 2008)

Moglex said:


> Indeed, you just neeed increase the (distance to wall) to (distance to subject) ratio (where the distances are the distances of the _light source_).


 
:thumbup:  It's all about the light ratio.  It only takes about 4, maybe 5 stops of light difference to blacken a white wall completely.


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## Moglex (Jul 29, 2008)

Quite, so putting some numbers to it, if your flash has a guide number of 11 ft and you were taking a shot of a subject at 1 foot, using f11, you would need a five stop difference to black out the background. That would mean the background should have an indicated exposure of f2 and to get that exposure with a guide number of 11 would require a distance of five and a half feet.

Obviously that calculation assumes similar reflectivity of background and subject.


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## zandman (Jul 29, 2008)

Overread said:


> Some great examples from Poppy 67 - go through both threads where she outlines the basic process used:
> 
> http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=130442
> http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=129339


 
that's exactly what i'm talking about, but he/she photoshoped it..
so when taking outdoor photos in the middle of the day, it won't be so possible to get that effect if it's too bright?

and on the flash, would the built-in flash on the camera work pretty good on this kind of photos? i have an external flash but i don't really use it a lot because i'm a big fan of "available light" but i'm willing to learn to use it properly to get a photo like that one. 

thanks.


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## Moglex (Jul 29, 2008)

zandman said:


> that's exactly what i'm talking about, but he/she photoshoped it..
> so when taking outdoor photos in the middle of the day, it won't be so possible to get that effect if it's too bright?


Not really possible, no.

(Although if your flash was powerful enough and the background far enough away it would still work.) 



> and on the flash, would the built-in flash on the camera work pretty good on this kind of photos? i have an external flash but i don't really use it a lot because i'm a big fan of "available light" but i'm willing to learn to use it properly to get a photo like that one.



At least from the POV of darkening the background the on camera flash is perfectly satisfactory (Assuming it's powerful enough to get the subject sufficiently illuminated).


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## NateS (Jul 29, 2008)

Moglex said:


> Not really possible, no.
> 
> (Although if your flash was powerful enough and the background far enough away it would still work.)
> 
> ...


 
This makes no sense. You state that it's not possible and then give an example of a way that it is possible. It's nowhere near not possible on a bright sunny day and it's extremely easy when you get the hang of it.

THis picture is high noon with no overcast and very very bright out. Settings were 1/250th shutter speed, F/14 with the flash on the subject. The black background is actually my green lawn. With 1/500th shutter speed I could have made the background completely black (that's not the look I wanted though). 






It's really simple, meter the shot so that it is horribly underexposed.....even snap a shot and see if it's basically black. Then kick on the flash and use the flash to light the subject and you'll end up with a black background as long as the background is a good 3-4 feet away or more.


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## zandman (Jul 29, 2008)

Moglex said:


> At least from the POV of darkening the background the on camera flash is perfectly satisfactory (Assuming it's powerful enough to get the subject sufficiently illuminated).


 
i tried doing this and what i got is a blurry background, (not black)
and light on the left side, i think it's because i'm doing it vertical.
and not too far background i supposed that's why i didn't got the black background?


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## zandman (Jul 29, 2008)

NateS said:


> This makes no sense. You state that it's not possible and then give an example of a way that it is possible. It's nowhere near not possible on a bright sunny day and it's extremely easy when you get the hang of it.
> 
> THis picture is high noon with no overcast and very very bright out. Settings were 1/250th shutter speed, F/14 with the flash on the subject. The black background is actually my green lawn. With 1/500th shutter speed I could have made the background completely black (that's not the look I wanted though).
> 
> ...


 
that's sweet, i'll try to do that on the weekend, hopefully the results will be pleasing.
did you use a normal flash or a ring flash?


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## JerryPH (Jul 29, 2008)

zandman said:


> i tried doing this and what i got is a blurry background, (not black)
> and light on the left side, i think it's because i'm doing it vertical.
> and not too far background i supposed that's why i didn't got the black background?



I think that one of the helping factors is if you could get your flash off camera.  Now, it can be done with the camera on flash, it's just a little more challenging.

Example:  If the flash is on a light stand with umbrella and is 12 inches from the subject, the apparent light source is a LOT closer to the subject than if you were standing 5 feet away with the flash on the camera.  Now, you can be 5 feet away, still get that same basic picture, but, the light fall-off happens a lot quicker for several reasons:

- The light source is a lot closer to the subject (1 ft vs 5 ft)
- Becuase its closer, you need to turn down the power else it overexposes
- Becuase it's turned down much more, it falls off faster
- Becuase it falls off faster, a wall that was perhaps light grey with the flash on the camera now becomes pitch black.
- It does this because the ratio has changed drastically.

Try it out, and play with it, it's a lot of fun!


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## NateS (Jul 29, 2008)

zandman said:


> that's sweet, i'll try to do that on the weekend, hopefully the results will be pleasing.
> did you use a normal flash or a ring flash?


 
That was a normal flash (SB-600) with a stofen diffuser.  It was off camera to the left of the subject, though it should work the same being on camera....you just get nicer effects when the light source doesn't come from the same direction as the image.

Here's another one using the same technique


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## Moglex (Jul 29, 2008)

NateS said:


> This makes no sense. You state that it's not possible and then give an example of a way that it is possible. It's nowhere near not possible on a bright sunny day and it's extremely easy when you get the hang of it.


It was a bit daft, wasn't it?

For some reaon I had my mind set on large subjects where having a powerful flash would be challenging.

Of course, going down in scale it becomes a great deal easier.


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## Bifurcator (Jul 29, 2008)

http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=128479 <-- See the pigeon shot to know what the daylight was like that day. The trees at the bottom were taken two hours later (after the flowers).


These were taken on a bright and sunny afternoon (in the shade) and are just the result of stopping way down and using a flash with the white diffuser (no photoshop needed):











​
All hand held at:

Exposure Time: 1/15 sec
F-Number: f/11.0
Exposure Program: Manual
ISO Speed Rating: 64

Sorry about the large images.   Me likes big!


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## zandman (Jul 29, 2008)

okay, i just got home and my flash's with me now, it's a speedlight sb-800?
to be honest this will be the first time i'm gonna use this flash cuz of the reason i said before. i'm gonna try all the settings you gave but trial will be in my room, battery's still charging, i'll get back soon for the outcome.


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## Bifurcator (Jul 29, 2008)

Cool! Yeah I think indoor light (house, etc. ) during the day is just about perfect... even with big windows. Just have your back to the window if it is daytime - it'll help.


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## zandman (Jul 30, 2008)

i feel dumb, it took me an hour to figure out how to use my flash.. :meh: :meh:
anyway, when i figured it out, i felt awesome, haha.
i got the effect i want, play with different settings both on the camera and on the flash, and figured out that it's really awesome, lol

here's the photos, it's not too good but i got the effects.
it's on the tripod, so it will be far from the background.

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5. i tried putting it above a mirror i got from a picture frame and underneath the mirror, a black paper, and yea, reflections, it's pretty cool though it's not perfect.


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## Moglex (Jul 30, 2008)

Excellent!

You've obviously got the gist of it and can experiment to your heart's content to get the exact effects you want.


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## zandman (Jul 30, 2008)

Moglex said:


> Excellent!
> 
> You've obviously got the gist of it and can experiment to your heart's content to get the exact effects you want.


 
thanks, i was experimenting on different setting for like half an hour and decided to stop when my neck started to hurt cuz i was sitting on the floor just to get far from the background, lol
also, one thing i noticed is like when there is a light in color on the background, it'll show up, because my drawer and bed pole shows up on some of the photos. (can see it on the 4th photo, upper right)


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## Moglex (Jul 30, 2008)

zandman said:


> also, one thing i noticed is like when there is a light in color on the background, it'll show up, because my drawer and bed pole shows up on some of the photos. (can see it on the 4th photo, upper right)



Yes.

As I said way back, if you can use a black backdrop the relative distances of the subject and background from the camera can be smaller. Much smaller than a particularly light background.

I have a sheet of black cotton that I can hang up when I want to do this type of shot.


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## zandman (Jul 30, 2008)

thanks for all the help, it's so much appreciated.


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## Do'Urden's Eyes (Aug 1, 2008)

No one has mentioned this yet some how... but im pretty sure another method or critical aspect is fast shutter speeds. the way i see it working (and it works) is your flash will be metered to your subject and then increasingly faster shutter speeds will slowly start to reduce the ambient lighting around the subject. am i right? because my flash im pretty sure only goes as low as 1/16 which is somewhat bright. 

am i wrong?


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## Bifurcator (Aug 1, 2008)

zandman said:


> i feel dumb, it took me an hour to figure out how to use my flash.. :meh: :meh:
> anyway, when i figured it out, i felt awesome, haha.
> i got the effect i want, play with different settings both on the camera and on the flash, and figured out that it's really awesome, lol
> 
> ...



Good stuff man!  I like them! I know how you feel about learning new equipment too. I think it's probably the same for all of us. What's a drag is when we don't use it for 6 months or so and then need to use it in a hurry only to find out we forgot everything and have to spend another hour to figure it out again.


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## manaheim (Aug 1, 2008)

Once you get the hang of that, you should try using a snoot. 

I need to seek therapy.  Snoot users anonymous or something.


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