Show us your Doll Studios!

i wish i had the room to have somplace really like that. Generally I use by bed for everything, that is photos, where the dolls stay (i have a shelf on my headboard), face ups and that sort of stuff.... I have a full size bed which takes up most of my room so yah.... I'd post a pic but it's a mess right now.

 

Now that I have a lighting tent, that's what I use. Before they just stand agains the wall

I don't have a picture of the tent from the outside though. I can take one soon if you'd like.

 

I've just been pushing everything aside in my living room and setting up on a little coffee table:


End result of this setup:


I'd love to have space to really move around!

 

Here is my (recently) cleaned up and reorganized studio. Too bad we're having to sell our house.

I keep the doll clothes and art supplies in the closet. And yes, I know I have a lot of paint. LOL

 

Bumping this thread so I don't have to open a new one! :P
I love looking at "behind the scenes" photos and their end results! I don't really have a doll "studio" so I hope these are all right

I had to improvise a lot before I had a tripod:


Result:


Another tripod improvisation:

The stool was my "tripod", which I heightened by placing manga on top. In the background is Floyd's pile of clothes.

Result:



I had to move everything in our garden around to prevent chairs/fly swatters/cups/magazines from getting into the frame -___- I love how Floyd looks so tiny and "lost" in the big garden xD

Result:



My sister thought I looked funny so she took a picture of me.

Result:

 

My house has horrible lighting, is very cluttered and there are virtually no good spots that has both light and space. My space is generally the downstairs family room with has windows that only gets light in the morning, and at a horrible angle, plus the walls are peach, so any light is refacted as a dull orange making my pictures very dark (and orange).

This means that my pictures have often been on my stairs with the front door open to let in natural light, or I took pictures outdoors. However, I just finished making a collapsable lightbox, which looks pretty good.

 

That picture looks really nice EilonwyG! A collapsable lightbox is a great idea for a home with little space =D

 

I don't have a permanent studio, but I'm going to be building a small set (built for Yo-SD and smaller) here soon. I found some cute wallpaper for it and everything. :3

 

How fun to see all this! Maxi and I are taking pics all over, a good deal of them in my work office. THAT is a disaster, but presents so many opportunities for photos since the boss is a coke memorabilia collector. I should be able to post a pic soon.

 

Here is my dolly area for faceup work and photos. I usually don't do a setup anymore for my gallery photos, since I like how natural lighting photos look better. This is an old tv cabinet I am reusing, but I might do some more remodeling and throw this thing away though. > >

 

I love seeing other DoA-er's photography spaces! I finally have one to show myself. I recently finished up my fancy collapsible light box.



It is a giant box, but I plan to have some EIDs in the future so it is a very good size for my bigger SDs. I am really glad I have it now; I photograph indoors and my apartment gets little to no light so a light box was a no-brainer. I still need to play around with it and experiment with lighting (as you can see in the picture I only have regular desk lamps for light ) but I took some shots of most of my dolls in it to see how it worked and it was such an improvement from any other photo shoots I've done! - at least in terms of lighting.

 

These set up pictures are great! I love new ideas. I'm still learning how to set my lights up so I don't get background shadow.

 

A couple of ideas for avoiding cast shadows on the backdrop is to either illuminate the backdrop with its own light, driving away the shadows, or to position your dolls far enough away from the backdrop that their cast shadows fall out of shot.

And you don't need lots of space or expensive equipment to set up a shot. Just a lot of patience.

Here is one of my set ups. I have posted it somewhere before, but can't find it, so here it is again.

This is the shot I wanted.



How I got it. I was trying to give the impression of moonlight, so had to move my light all over the place until it looked a bit like that but also lit the two dolls sufficiently (and lighting two dolls facing eachother is a challenge all by itself). I found that overhead light was best. So I then perched my lamp on top of my table, shoved my diffuser disc underneath it (or the light would have been too harsh) and illuminated my "moon" background from behind (it is a big piece of black card with holes punched in it for the stars and a photo of the moon printed out on photocopier paper and then stuck into a moon-sized hole in the black card, with a shower curtain to diffuse all the light). I had to raise the dolls up on books to get their heads in the right place against the moon. It isn't pretty, but it worked.

 

That is awesome! Almost like the movies: making it isn't pretty, but the effects sure are.

 

Lovelt ideas, please add more pics for all of us who can't...

 

This is one of my oldest photo studios



This is what I got:


But now I`m using softboxes

 

Thank you all for your pics on your studios. I especially like the "light box"

 

Here is one photo of my new lightboxes

 

LOVE these shots everyone is sharing! Has anyone used any of those cool looking scenic backdrops they sell on Ebay? I'm curious to see how they work!!!

 

I have used a tiny version of those scenic backdrops. They can be quite effective. You just hang/tack it up on a wall/table/whatever, making sure that enough of it drapes on the floor so that the dolls can stand on it, throw a bit of light at it and Bob's your uncle.


Apologies for the half-naked Pong. I am not quite sure what happened there.

If you want a set up shot, I'm sure I can persuade my tinies to show you how it is done.

 

I thought only we Texans had such colorful vernacular!!! lol! I love it! ("..and Bob's your uncle." !!!)
LOVE how the backdrop worked out! My husband is a photog and has tons of backdrops...all of them quite boring for a BJD ~ so I'm SOLD!
However, I'm so poor I couldn't buy a mouse a wrestling jacket....so, I'll have to put it on the back-burner for now. I'm fixin to sell a few things, so i might not be waiting till hell freezes over.

 

I think you meant softbox. I was totally confused for a bit lol before I made the connection

 

LOL FrankieCat! You'll have me posting in Cockney rhyming slang in a minute, and then where would we be?

You can get tiny-sized "backdrops" (read "scrapbooking paper") for pence. Literally. If you have an art/craft/hobby shop nearby, check out the scrapbooking stuff. Rich pickings. My lakeside scene was by Sugartree, eg http://www.cranberrycat.com/SugarTreeScrapbookPapers.htm.

ETA: A set up shot using one of the 12x12 Sugartree scrapbooking papers with a tiny.



And what it looks like from the front.

 

MadamMauMau: I love your picture and that was behind.
Very clever

 

I live in a one-bedroom apartment, so there's not much room. Everything I use has to be easy to break down and put together. This is an old example, but I'm using something similar.

The biggest difference now is that I'm putting the "wood floor", which is actually adhesive tiles from Home Depot stuck to a foam core board, on top of a small folding table, which makes it much easier to shoot. I usually "hang" a backdrop of some sort behind the dolls, either fabric if I want something interesting, or craft foam rolls if I want a "seamless".

Here's a shot from the previous setup, with a fabric backdrop:

 

This is such a stellar thread! I've been testing out some ideas and set ups for taking photos of my doll and this thread is so inspiring! Thanks for posting, everyone. I'd love to see more.