quick and easy backdrop tutorial

I needed to make a quick background for a couple of Steve photos (that i hope to have finished at the end of the week) the background will more than likely be slightly out of focus and darkly lit so i really didn’t need to make anything detailed, since I’m often asked about set-building for doll photos I thought id share a few super quick and inexpensive modeling tricks.


I started out with a couple sheets of foam board (available nearly everywhere) i cut it into strips and squares and then glued the smaller pieces onto a larger sheet, after gluing down all my panels i then cast a bunch of resin hemispheres, (for those of you who don’t have a PILE of silicone hemisphere molds in every size imaginable) you can get wood/plastic buttons and hemispheres in various sizes at most craft stores (look in the woodworking or jewelry section). I then glued the hemispheres in patterns to replicate the look of rivet heads or bolts, I then painted the whole thing in a light grey acrylic and added dirt stains and rust using paint and pastel powder..


I didn’t have much time to work on this, i think i spent about 4 or 5 hours on it total, i could have done it much faster is i had my hemispheres pre-cast, and I think i only spent in total about 5 or 6 dollars in foam-board, resin and paint.