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Three cheap and easy DIY reflectors you can use to take your portraits to the next level

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Reflectors are one of the most valuable tools a portrait photographer can own. And we’re not talking about monetary value, but usefulness. Their cost is relatively inexpensive, but the value they can bring to your images can be pretty immense. But what if you’re just starting out and don’t want to buy one or several reflectors of varying sizes? Or what if you just don’t have the size and shape of reflector you need in an emergency?

Well, here’s Jay P Morgan from The Slanted Lens here to save the day with three DIY options that you can repurpose for use as very effective reflectors. You might already even own one or all of the things he shows off in the video and not even thought about using it as a reflector before.

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Creating dappled light with a DIY reflector

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What if I told you that i only used one light to create this image. It’s true. I used one of my favorite lighting modifiers— a DIY reflector. To make it I covered a sheet of cardboard with self-adhesive mirror tiles, first scoring it in two places for easy folding. It works well with both studio strobes and sunlight, with the ripple texture of the cardboard adding a dappled appearance to the light.

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How to make a 2-in-1 DIY foldable reflector on a budget

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A reflector and a flag are useful pieces of kit you should have in your kit. In this video, photographer Alastair Bird shows you how to make your own 2-in-1 reflector and flag. The white side works as a reflector to give you a nice, soft fill light, and you can use the black side as a flag. It’s cheap, easy to build, and it fits in your car along with all the gear you carry to a shoot.

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How studio polyboards work and how to make your own DIY alternatives

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Nearly every professional studio I’ve ever used has these ‘polyboards’ and you‘ve probably even seen them yourself but may not have known what they’re used for. Polyboards are polystyrene boards that usually measure 4 feet wide by 8 feet high and are normally 2 inches thick.

One of the other defining characteristics is that they are often white on one side and black on the other. This dual colour is very important as this gives them two key uses.

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Make a dead-simple DIY reflector with an emergency blanket and poster board

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One of the most basic tools every portrait photographer should have in their arsenal is a reflector. It can be used with natural light, in a studio, pretty much anywhere, really.

While it’s easy to go out and buy one for $20–40, it’s also possible to make a much more affordable DIY reflector by using little more than an emergency blanket and poster board.[Read More…]

How To Make the World’s Best Lighting Modifier for $5

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Lighting modifiers can have a huge impact on specialized shots.  With the right ones, light becomes putty in your hand, easily molded by the skill of the potter.  (Yeah, I jumble up my euphemisms frequently.)

YouTuber Theoria Apophasis believes in the the power of light modifiers, but he believes even more in ingenuity.  The “Angry Photographer” shared one of his favorite homemade mods to get creative lighting that adds drama to his images.  This is one of the best lighting mods and can be easily created with craft store supplies for $5.

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Photographing The Movement Of Dancers Using Speedlights And Long Exposure

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Photographer, Phillip McCordall, has put together a great video tutorial explaining the how he uses a combination of studio lighting, slow shutter speeds, and rear curtain sync to create almost atmospheric photographs of dancers, such as the photo you see above. While there are many applications in which you can use this technique on, the graceful leaps of the dancer are really eye catching when you are able to illustrate the motion of them, too.

If you’re not already familiar with rear curtain sync, this could be a really fun project for you learn it with. To put it briefly, when shooting with a rear curtain sync, the flash will fire at the end of the exposure rather than the beginning of the exposure. When used with a slow shutter speed, this allows you to record motion (as a blur) using only the ambient light at the beginning of the exposure, then right before the shutter closes, the flash will fire and freeze the motion.
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