I saw where a couple of you asked for pics of my lightbox and I didn't see that until today - doh! This is very simple to make - get a few full sheets of posterboard at Walmart or Target, then go to Home Depot and get a stick of 1 1/4" PVC pipe, 3 clamp-on lights and 3 daylight 75 watt flourescent bulbs. Oh yea you need one (1) white garbage bag. You should also get a plug strip to plug the lights into. Make the box as big as you'd like - I made mine about 20" across and about the same depth. I cut the posterboard out and just used masking tape to put it together. That way I can take i down in no time, or re-do it to a different size. I cut the garbage bag to the right size and taped it in place as a diffuser - easy stuff! Then build a rack for the lights using the PVC pipe, and just push the pipe into the fittings - no need for glue. Clamp the lights on with the bulbs in them, put a tripod in front and you're ready. At Walmart I even found decorative paper in the crafts section and use that as a background. All of this came from a thread here http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=328550&page=1&pp=20
Nice setup, I might have to "borrow" the idea for use in taking pictures of my woodturnings. Right now for my pens/pencils/letter openers/key chains I just scan them in. But scanning is hard to do for a bowl Ryan
This light box works better than I thought it would, and I just found a few more good backgrounds at Michael's. Not that I shop there, uh, just went with the wife! You could make it much smaller is all your items are smaller.
There's a real good photog guy who goes by "Sharp By Coop" on some forums, and this is all his idea. As usual, I just steal 'em and use 'em.
