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The 5 Minutes, $1.50 Reflector And How To Use It

Jul 4, 2015 by Laya Gerlock 8 Comments

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Feature-image-reflector-title

I’ve already used those DIY reflectors in a couple of my articles but I’ve never actually did a full post explaining how they are built and used. I want to show you how easy it is to make this reflector and how useful it can be. Definitely a good use for $1.50. It actually takes around 5 minutes to make it and you can make it as big or small as you need.

What you will need

  • Illustration board or foam board
  • Tape and scissors
  • Clamps or binder clips
  • Aluminum foil or Silver Gift Wrapping Paper
  • Optional: Gold wrapping paper

5min Reflector1

How to do it:

Step 1 – setting size

Cut a piece of the foam (or illustration) board the size you want. I make mine quite small because I mostly use them for my still life photography.

5min Reflector4

Step 2 – foil

Cut a bigger piece of aluminium foil or silver gift wrapping paper. I used aluminium foil before but have used silver gift wrapping paper when I had non available (don’t ask).

5min Reflector2

5min Reflector5

Step 3 – matching

There are two ways to do this. If you have double stick tape you can just put double stick tape on the board and stick the aluminum foil to it.

If you only have good old regular tape, fold the aluminium to the back of the board and tape it. Do this for all sides. If you have excess foil or wrapper on the sides, just cut it away.

5min Reflector6

5min Reflector7

Step 4 – placement

Use your clamp or binder clip to make your mini reflector stand.

5min Reflector8

5min Reflector9

5min Reflector12

5min Reflector14

After that your done! Gotta admit, well spent 5 minutes and several cents. Making a few of those will probably set ou back a buck fifty.

Testing out the 5 minutes reflector

First, have a look on how adding a few of this those little reflectors can impact your photo

diy-reflectora-ani

For this test I used one light thru a softbox on the right, facing the subject

5min Reflector25

5min Reflector15

I placed a DIY reflector on the opposite side of the softbox to fill in the shadows.

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5min Reflector16

I placed another one just beside the camera to get some highlight near the shutter and and more fill on the grip.

5min Reflector23

5min Reflector17

To get some “catchlights” on the lens, I carefully placed a reflector in front of the camera and angled it so that I got some nice catchlights and a little bit fill light on the lens itself.

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5min Reflector18

Lastly, my last reflector went on the left-back side of the camera to get some highlight on the side of the the camera and also some highlights on the left side of the lens hood.

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5min Reflector19

Final Image

Here are some examples of using this reflector on previous tutorials.

A really big diy reflector: Build A $300 Music Stand Triflector For $29

5min reflector examples1

How To Shoot A Watch Using One Light And All The DIY Gear In The World

5min reflector examples11

5min reflector examples12

Tips On Getting Gradient Reflection On Reflective Surfaces Part 2

5min reflector examples9

5min reflector examples3

How To Perfectly Capture Steam In Food Photography

5min reflector examples8

5min reflector examples2

How To Create The Perfect Milk Splash In The Studio

5min reflector examples5

5min reflector examples4

You can also use this reflector to get some back light on your subject by reflecting the main light: How To Shoot The Perfect Perfume Shot Using El Bokeh Wall

5min reflector examples7

5min reflector examples6

FIND THIS INTERESTING? SHARE IT WITH YOUR FRIENDS!

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Related posts:

Introducing Omega Reflector 360 – the world’s first 15-in-1 reflector How to make DIY 2-in-1 reflector in 5 minutes Default ThumbnailStudio Lighting – Cheap DIY Homemade Reflector Stand Make a dead-simple DIY reflector with an emergency blanket and poster board

Filed Under: DIY Tagged With: lighting, lighting tutorial, reflector

Laya Gerlock: from diyphotography.net

About Laya Gerlock

Laya Gerlock is a Portrait and Product photographer based in the Philippines. His passion is teaching and sharing his knowledge in Photograpy and has been doing this for 6 years. You can follow his work on his web page, follow him on Flickr and if you happen to come by Cubao, Quezon City (To Manila, Philippines) he gives a great workshop!

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