Black Reflectors and Black Umbrella in white studio???

[harlequin]

Dear APUG,

Was invited to photo shoot in studio for some designer clothing.
Studio was white and the umbrellas and reflectors were black?
I saw on the polaroid that it was actually pretty contrasty, almost looked like ringlight...

a) Anybody have experience with this lighting setup.
b) was using speedotron 102 heads with black reflectors
c) also black umbrella with speedo head placed at 60 degree angle to subject
d) I know you would lose a stop or two with the black vs silver/white setup, but there has to
be more too it than that.....

Has any APUG member tried this, and if so what was the purpose/effect,
any photo sample to illustrate this would be appreciated. I remember Douglas Dubler played with
black reflectors and black umbrellas when shooting UV light onto models with dyglo colors for dramtatic
blacklight poster effect...

Many Thanks for any input?

Regards,

Harlequin.

 

[cliveh]

Never heard of this and would suggest it should be the opposite, with a black studio and white reflectors.

 

[M Carter]

You can also turn a softbox inside-out; it basically gives you sort of a bulb-light look, and the umbrella or softbox controls spill; and since the bulb is surrounded by black, you get none of the effects a reflector gives, the light seems a little more directional and hard to my eye.

The loss of a stop and so on doesn't matter much when shooting people with a pack and head setup like Speedo - you're probably dialed down a fair amount already, and metering and proofing dial it all in. Even with smaller Speedo packs, I'm still fighting to knock them down a bit (unless you're doing tabletop product and so on).

 

[cliveh]

How can a reflector be black? If it's black it's not a reflector.

 

[M Carter]

How can a reflector be black? If it's black it's not a reflector.

I have several black Speedo reflectors - they're designed for snoots, but can give a grid head a more direct look. In that case, they're more like a flag or something, but they're still called "reflectors" (and being a gloss finish, they likely still reflect some photons).