Paw prints on your background paper?

Seamless paper is a long wide roll of paper that photographers use to give a  plain even background to their studio images. When mounted to a wall or stand, it drops down then curves out along the floor creating a seamless background.

I usually order my rolls from Amazon Japan as the shipping to Okinawa is free. This is particularly important as shipping items that are 2.72 meters long would normally result in extra shipping costs. Rolls usually come in two sizes 2.72m x 11m and 1.36 x 11m. There are many different colors to choose from but I stick with plain white and charcoal grey. I also have my portable plain black velvet background for karate master portraits.

Some photographers use patterned muslin backgrounds, but I find they make images look very dated. Colored seamless backgrounds have their place, and Japanese studios often use pale pink and pale yellow backdrops, but I stick with white, grey and black. Gradations in tone can be created by aiming a light at the paper.

As the background is paper, and as it runs down the wall and across the floor, it can easily get dirty or torn. Of course you could keep using the paper and fix the tears and blotches in Photoshop, but it’s usually more time efficient to simply cut off the old section and bring down a fresh clean piece. The discarded piece of paper can then go in the trash…..

or you can give it to a friend who has children.

Recycling seamless paper

Shawn picked up a piece of white paper which had a few too many paw prints, splashes of paint, and wrinkles. It became a fun art project for the kids in his local community. Awesome!