Most of what I shoot consists of muted tones, so I was extremely excited when I saw the Dark Planks Floor Drop Savage Universal offered. I knew it would match my style perfectly and couldn’t wait to test it out. I opted for the 8′ x 8′ size because I photograph pets sometimes and felt it would give me more room to move around, though they do offer two smaller versions: a 4′ x 5′ and 5′ x 7′. I really like the quality of the floor drop. The backing is rubber and the top feels like a tight carpet material which is great for not showing any reflections. This first shot was done in my living room. Another advantage, to me, is being able to unroll just what you need of the 8′ x 8′. I’d rather have too much to work with, than not enough.

This next shot was used for a high school senior. We did this in his garage. For the DQ shot, as you can see we just clamped it up to his garage door. We then tucked the bottom back underneath the garage door we left cracked a bit.

I also photograph shelter pets for the Roice-Hurst Humane Society here in Grand Junction. I thought the look of this floor drop could add a nice look, something other than a paper seamless backdrop like I usually do for them.

Oh, and the cats LOVED this, so much more than paper. There were a few that wouldn’t stop sharpening their claws on it.

I really enjoyed the versatility of this floor drop and look forward to trying other designs out to see what I can come up with.

*A note about my editing: I do darken the spaces between the planks in post to make them completely black.

If you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment below!

James Lout

When I was a teen, I was looking through a drawing section of my local library and happened across a misplaced book, it was a book on black and white photography by Ansel Adams. From that point on I was infatuated by photography. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to pursue it until I joined the Marines and bought my first SLR camera in Hong Kong in 1998, a Canon 888. I think I photographed anything and everything I could and, of course, a lot of black and white. Fast forward to 2011 and I decided to take this hobby of mine to something more so I upgraded to digital and started studying the technical side of photography. I took my first photograph of freezing liquids with flash with that new camera, a Canon 60D, and was hooked and still today liquids is one of my favorite things to shoot when not photographing portraiture. Check out my website here.    Learn More