Painting a Room Black for Documentary Interviews???

J

jrod81

Veteran
My wife has been kind enough to agree to let me close in half of our two car garage to make a studio for my next documentary venture. I am essentially planning to "mock" the interviews seen at www.iamsecond.com and would like a bit of advice on painting a room... I realize I could use black backdrops but I want to have freedom to walk around the subject with a B camera for pick up shots and I don't want to worry about a piece of the wall showing because I did not buy a large enough backdrop or backdrops... So I would prefer just to paint the entire area black... is this a bad idea for light reflecting/absorbing/etc... I would assume a matte or eggshell paint is better than a gloss or semi gloss... I appreciate any input.
thanks
jared
 
Black matte velour drapes absorb light like a black hole and has the added benefit of absorbing a ton of sound too and generally improving accoustics. If you are worried about shooting from other angles just get three pieces and make a giant U out of them. You don't even need backdrop stands, you can easily grommet them and hang curtain-rods from the ceiling.
 
As a practical matter, why don't you get some high-risers, some velour, park your car outside for a few hours and set up a temporary studio in your whole garage. It shouldn't take long to set up when you need it. I fear that following your plan to build a permanently walled, single-car-space studio you won't have enough room for a set, equipment, crew and shooting space for a floating B-roll camera. You most likely won't be able to get a shot any wider than a CU in such a small space. If you temporarily set-up a full garage studio you will, at least, have enough space to have different shots between your cameras . . . and with success, you can build, or rent, a real studio.
Good luck.

P.S. - I believe that I would set this up diagonally in the garage, too.
 
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