How to make your own DIY portable green screen with PVC pipe and a pillow case
Apr 19, 2018
John Aldred
John Aldred is a photographer with over 25 years of experience in the portrait and commercial worlds. He is based in Scotland and has been an early adopter – and occasional beta tester – of almost every digital imaging technology in that time. As well as his creative visual work, John uses 3D printing, electronics and programming to create his own photography and filmmaking tools and consults for a number of brands across the industry.
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If you don’t quite have the budget to kill off green screen yet, or perhaps even the budget for a proper green screen, there are other options. For Dave Knop, the answer was some green pillow cases he found at his local Goodwill. In this video, he shows us how he turned them into a portable green screen panel with the help of some PVC pipe.
It’s quite simple, really. Lay your pillowcase out flat, measure the piece of pipe against it, and then cut them. And once all the pieces are snugly fitted together, slide it inside the case. Dave did iron his pillowcase (before he inserted the poles) just to get rid of a crease from how it was folded, but other than that there’s not much more to do.
The green colour won’t be as exact as purpose made chroma key green materials, but it’ll be good enough if you’re on a low budget. Most software these days can handle keying out just about any solid colour you wish, but actual chroma key green is less likely to bleed into other colours in your scene, whereas slightly different greens might contain a little more yellow or blue, potentially causing issues. But this one works well enough for Dave.
If you don’t happen to get so lucky with finding green pillows in your local charity shops, I did manage to find some on Amazon. I’m sure there are plenty of other options out there if you look hard enough.
Dave also shows it briefly with a white pillowcase which, in a pinch, can become a cheap and easy reflector. Although, 5-in-1 reflectors aren’t all that expensive to begin with.
John Aldred
John Aldred is a photographer with over 25 years of experience in the portrait and commercial worlds. He is based in Scotland and has been an early adopter – and occasional beta tester – of almost every digital imaging technology in that time. As well as his creative visual work, John uses 3D printing, electronics and programming to create his own photography and filmmaking tools and consults for a number of brands across the industry.
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3 responses to “How to make your own DIY portable green screen with PVC pipe and a pillow case”
This is what i miss from this blog. Diy photography- it used to be all of these diy projects to do fancy things on the cheap. We want more of this!
Exactly. These are the interesting posts I look for. And the comments are often a lot more civil on these types of posts.
Agreed. This is what should be here more. Not “build xyz for $50” only to find out because they happened to have something on hand that would cost $500 and is crucial to the build. Let alone some of the articles that are not much more than fluff reviews just to drive traffic.
Real DIY with realistic prices and outcomes.