Background beauty

View The Video Want to give your still life shots an elegant yet consistent look? Lauren scott brings you an easy way to style scenes using photo boards

paying attention to the background of your style life shots can instantly transform them from boring to beautiful. The most successful lifestyle photographers and bloggers have got a style – they know how to arrange scenes and match colours to make the most enchanting scenes. They also use complementary textures and props behind their subjects to complete the mood of an image. To instantly transform small scenes, buying (and shooting with) a dedicated background is a good place to start if you want to follow suit. In this project, we’ll show you how stunning Photo Boards (www.photoboards.org) can be used to create and complete a mini still life set.

Photo boards are small photography backdrops that have been designed to look like real textures in small scenes, where the background or surface is in contact with the subject. They’re made from a lightweight PVC, with a printed design in a smooth satin photographic finish on one side that looks like a real textured surface. These handy boards are true 1:1 scale backgrounds of original wood, stone, metal and fabric textures, and they realistically emulate shadow depth in typical lighting scenarios. In short they’re a perfect alternative to using a flat, falselooking background.

Photo Boards are designed for photographing small items, but come sized as a 40cm or 60cm square. The 40cm size is ideal for jewellery, books and flowers, while the 60cm designs make room for table settings and incorporating larger items.

For the best results with these boards, the key thing is not to shoot them too closely. Despite being high resolution, magnifying them beyond what the eye can see means that the print dots start to become visible. You should also aim to reduce reflections on the smooth surface of the boards, as this will add depth to background textures. It’s worth the effort of adjusting your camera angle to avoid unwanted reflections.

Whether you’re a keen blogger, a food or product photographer, or if you just want to make the branding of your photo website more cohesive, these boards are on-trend and easy to use (a wipeclean surface makes tidying up crumbs and spills a cinch!). Enjoy creating sets that have a little more panache!

Find out more info at www.photoboards.org