Help with basic still life kit

[dustym]

I shoot 5x4 black and white I would like to use natural light , as well as artificial. Im looking for a inexpensive kit mainly to shoot metal objects can anybody help.A little help background colour choice methods wouldbe great.

Thanks
Dustym

[Ray Heath]

g'day dustym,
hows about a large window and a big sheet of foamcore, and several cheap halogen 500w lights from the local hardware store

[Markok765]

get a flash and one of those big diffusor things. alternatively, get a softbox and 2 daylight blannces bulbs

[John Koehrer]

dustym,
About the easiest way to light highly reflective objects is to use tents. They're available commercialy they're not very expensive, or you can cobble one up using a translucent fabric & embroidery hoop at the top to give it some form.
Once you have the surround you can introduce controlled reflections using black(or colored) foamcore or fabric etc.
There's a pretty good book on lighting for still life by Steve Bavister that gives examples with lighting maps. Might be able to pick up a copy @ Amazon etc.
Sometimes the hardest thing is to eliminate reflections of the camera, I shoot through black foamcore with a hole cut through it just large enough for the lens to pass through.

[MattKing]

dustym,
About the easiest way to light highly reflective objects is to use tents. They're available commercialy they're not very expensive, or you can cobble one up using a translucent fabric

I've been tempted to buy one of these:

Ikea Tent

to see if it could be made to work for this purpose.

Matt

[dustym]

I've been tempted to buy one of these:

Ikea Tent

to see if it could be made to work for this purpose.

Matt

For GBP4.00 ill give it a crack what a gret idea, that and some foam core, I will report back

Thanks chaps

[Mark H]

For backgrounds, I've used tri-fold presentation boards from office supply stores (they come in white and black). Lighting consisted of a couple of inexpensive halogen desk lamps (with goosenecks) shining through white plastic (cut from garbage bags) set in embroidery hoops strategically placed...careful to keep this far enough away from those hot lights. Pieces of cardboard clamped onto lightstands (or whatever) served as gobos (is that the right term for light blocker?).
Those same garbage bags can be placed behind the subject and the light shone through from behind to blow out the background completely.
Very inexpensive, and it was a good way to learn lighting principles.
I'm attempting to add an attachment as an example ( a poor scan, but it gives some idea of the effect).