Last week an actor friend of mine asked me if I could shoot some headshots of her - she had recently had two different headshot sessions and was unhappy with the results. I told her that I would give it a try, even though I don't have alot of portrait experience. I looked around my house and realized that I don't have much equipment for shooting portraits other than my trusty Sunpak 383 flash. So I went to Calumet and picked up a cheap lightstand and a soft-silver brolly. I also planned on doing some natural light shots. When I saw the prices for sunbounce reflectors I almost passed out. Inspired by Craig's recent DIY experiments, I was determined to find a cheaper solution.
So a trip to the 99¢ store and I found a nice big silver reflector.
This is the type used for car winshields to keep your car cooler in the summer. I knocked out a frame for it in my garage using scrap pieces of redwood, and then used my staple gun to attach the reflector. The resulting reflector is about 4 1/2 feet by 2 1/2 feet, is very lightweight, and has a nice handle for an assistant to hold, or to clamp to a tripod.
Here is what it looks like:
and here is the back showing the frame:
I used it as a primary light source and then used a piece of foamboard for a fill reflector. I positioned the subject so that the sun would act as a hairlight.
The result turned out like this:
I am pretty happy with the results I got for 99¢ and more importantly, my friend was very pleased with the shots. The reflector doesn't fold up nicely like the commercial reflectors, but it is pretty hard to complain for the price. I'll post a seperate thread later showing the indoor setup I used.
Incidentally, if you recognize this actor, please do not post her name here. I am only leaving this shot up for a few days and don't want the search engines to find it out of respect for her.
