by Paul JaruszewskiIf you are in the market for a home-brew photo stage, you may be interested in reading about the stage I built and use.

General Information

The Melor Photo Stage.

Photo taken with Canon G2, Hot lights This stage wasn’t entirely my concept, but an idea gathered from the images sent me by 3 people who had made their own stages.

It is made with 3/4″ PVC, a sheet of 2′ by 4′ Plexiglas and

two $7 lights from Ikea. Certain pieces are not glued to facilitate

breakdown and storage. The legs are removable to table top placement, the

Plexiglas top is held in place with Velcro. I plan on getting another

light or two and trying the reveal bulbs by GE that several people have

mentioned. The shot of the needle from this weeks macro assignment, and

the tortilla from last weeks assignment were both shot on this stage.

The tortilla was lit from below and atop by flash and the needle by the

“hot lights.” If any construction details are wanted, please post here. I

am still in the feeling-out stage with the setup, and have yet to get a

decent lens for my D60 to use on this table. You will see more from this

table in the future. Below is an image of the cartridges used in a dental

syringe. The paper below the cartridges is mat paper, and probably not

what I would use to take a serious image because of the texture.

Photo taken with Canon G2, Hotlights. I use the stage most often illuminated from above with an opaque field under the subject.

D60, 550EX with soft box above and 420EX below. This photo illustrates the ability to illuminate your subject from below. The field is covered with wax paper to diffuse the flash below slightly and (mostly) keep the Plexiglas free of tortilla oils.

D60, 550EX with softbox.

Construction Details:

• 30 feet 3/4 inch schedule 40 PVC – Yes, 30 feet. Unless you don’t make legs you will use this much.
• 2 3/4 inch cross connectors(ssss)
• 20 3/4 inch “T” connectors(sss)
• 14 3/4 inch connectors (ss)
• 7 3/4 inch elbows (ss)
• 1 2 foot by 4 foot Plexiglas
• 6 Velcro fasteners

The s and ss stand for Slip

and Slip Slip. This means that the piece has non-threaded ends. All the

pieces are of the slip variety. There are no pipe threads to deal with.

The sss is a T with three slip ends. Simple. The pipe pieces are

inexpensive. Buy a few extra so when your glue dries and the pieces aren’t

square you aren’t driving back to the hardware store.

• PVC adhesive ( clear )
• 1/2 inch drill bit for light standards
• lights – I used two IKEA lights. I am a cheap SOB

The majority of my connectors

are not glued. They stick well together and can be glued later if needed

for stability ( mine is quite stable ) or because you don’t want to

collapse the table.

There are several major

connectors made of several PVC parts that I wanted very stable. These are

glued as indicated below. The table was designed so that the pipe pieces

were the same length for the upper and lower table. This made construction

easier and will make adjusting the size easier if so desired. Between the

glued connectors, there is a small 1/2 to 3/4 inch piece of pipe that

spans the gap between the two connectors. You cannot simply glue the two

connectors together, there is a small piece of pipe in between. I first

cut a bunch of the small pipe pieces to place between the joints of the

other connectors. I then made the major connectors out of the PVC

components. Be careful not to slop glue into the ends of the connectors

that you want to friction fit to the pipes unless you are seeking a lot of

friction… After the major connectors were done, I cut the pipe pieces

and after a few adjustments had a table that would allow the 2 by 4 foot

Plexiglas to lay upon it. A few tabs of Velcro and I was set. After

getting it the way I liked it size-wise, I then replaced two 90 degree

pieces with T’s drilled for the 1/2 inch light standards. Done deal. The

table can easily be taken down and stored because it isn’t glued

everywhere. Mine is under my bed right now unless I am shooting some

pictures with it.

The legs. Any size you want.

Too tall and the thing will rock. I like the height shown because I can

get lights underneath ( tortilla – sun spot picture ), or I can set the

contraption on the kitchen table w/o the legs and save my back for shots

that don’t require backlighting. Post a reply to me if you make a table

and let me know how it went. If you can think of any cool improvements,

let me know as well.

As you can see the Plexiglas is pretty solid.

This is the most complex piece ( 7 individual piecesand the 6 little pieces of pipe between them) The slip-slip on the top left was included only to make the uprights the same size for convenience with cutting and assembly.

Under every RED marked glue joint is a small piece of pipe that cannot be seen.

When I first made the table, there were no light provisions. I replacedthe elbows with T’s when I found lights I liked. Since they weren’t glued, it was easy. I used the T’s instead of elbows to hold the lights because I wanted the light to pass through two sets of plastic.

As Featured By:

Nigel Burken

I hope you have found this information useful. Drop me an line and let me know if you made a table for yourself.