Earlier in the summer I wrote about making an Instant Pop-up Universal Airfield. Its purpose is to provide a sort of realistic diorama base upon which I can place scale model aircraft, that I build as part of my obsession, and then photograph them.

What was missing was a decent backdrop. I had attempted something using a set of photos I had taken locally, stitched together and mucked about with in Affinity Photo to give the thing a faded sort of look. It worked, but was unsatisfactory as the largest image I can print is A3 — and it’s amazing how the joins can show up in photos, no matter how artfully the lighting is arranged!

Eventually I got round to having the image printed on a large format device, the sort of thing that is used to produce banners and pop-up exhibition stands. Now all I needed was some way to hold the image up. Pritt Stick and an A1 foam board sheet would not work.

A friend and neighbour is good with wood, and I approached him with a view to helping me create a supporting framework for the backdrop image. The framework needed to be easily set up, self-supporting, and easy to clip the printed image to. Equally, it had to be readily folded so it didn’t take up a lot of the limited storage space I have available. Remember, the whole pop-up airfield affair can’t be left set up as the only space available is my work bench — and that is usually occupied with work, among other things.

I realised I was being a bit ambitious, so the frame remained literally on the drawing board while I had a think.

I then got a bit distracted — nothing new here, move along please — and starting researching lighting rigs. Photo sessions around the bench tend to get a bit congested, especially if I deploy both LED panels on their tripod stands. I wondered if there was something less awkward that might let me mount the panels above the diorama set.

It turns out there probably is, but could very easily get costly. Looking around further, I wondered if a backdrop stand system might be be able to support the panels. I discovered that would be complicated, and unlikely to work. But…

The backdrop stands were a reasonable price, and might be ideal for supporting the backdrop print.

I ordered a system.

The system is very easy to set up. The tripods extend much higher than my living room ceiling, and the cross bar has four interlocking sections that gives a stretch of about four metres. The idea is the photographer has a roll of background paper or cloth on the cross bar, and just pulls it out to take photos or video in front of it. I’m still considering a roll of plain white muslin.

From this image, you can see my problem with space. One tripod on the bench, the other on the floor! There is stuff on the bench which will eventually be removed, and that will allow the setup to sit further back towards the window. With that space problem sort of catered for, and feeling somewhat encouraged with my scheme, I had to try the backdrop in place.

The cross bar has only two sections at this stage. After taking this image, I decided to try adding a third section, pushing the left tripod into the doorway just out of shot on the left. This was because I want the backdrop to extend much further to the sides of the diorama sheet in front of it. I brought the diorama sheet in and set it up in front of everything. Of course, I didn’t photograph this part of the experiment. I let it all sit there for a while, while I bobbed up and down, viewing things from different angles, adjusting the height of the tripods and so on until I was happy.

I am very pleased. It is awkward, gets in the way, but the whole system collapses down into a carrying case not much larger than my tripod case. I did some measuring of the backdrop print, and it has since been trimmed for length to make it a little more manageable. I also think I shall order a further print, but get it scaled down by about 25 per cent. I also need to purchase a couple more spring clamps to hold the sheet in place on the cross bar.

My backdrop now has something to hold it up. I just need to find some time to set the whole thing up properly for a shoot to prove it works properly.

The scale drawing of the wooden effort I originally planned has been quietly binned. We shall speak of it no more.