Introduction: DIY Background

Sometimes you will want to post an item or DIY project on the Internet but you dont want any part of your home to be seen on the internet. How can you prevent this?

Easy. Just build a background.
The background can be used to give a more professional photographic feel to the pictures of what your posting. Useful for auctioning an item on auction sites such as eBay, uBid, eBid and CMarket.

Also by substituting the background paper with green screening material you can use your computer to change the background with possibly different scenery.

NOTE: This is entered for the Epilog challenge.

Step 1: Step ONE

To start building a display for possible DIY projects, you'll need to figure out what you are going to build the display frame out of. Becasue I had them around, I used the parts from a Meccano set to build my version.

The clever things about using Meccano pieces to build the Display frame is that they are relatvitely cheap and that they can be bought in large amounts for little dough. Also, the metals that are used in the meccano pieces are probaley recyclable and they because of the Lego-like qualities about Meccano, the pieces can be re-arranged into something else for possibly another project (DIY or otherwise).

But to start building, assemble a base and attach meccano pieces in a vertical fashion.

Then, attach a piece horizontally to brace the vertical segments.

By figuring out how high your background material is compared to your background frame, you will then put another horizontal piece near where the top of the material's length, this is so you can attach a paperclip or something to the horizontal piece and the material to keep them clamped together.

The picture should be able to clear this up if this is confusing

Step 2: Step TWO

Now after assembling the frame from Step One, you can go and use a bracket to attach another horizontal piece that will become the place where the next sheet of background material will clamp onto.

After doing this, you'll have to construct something to counterbalance the entire background frame and prevent it from tipping over because it might be off balance, there are two ways to balance it.

1.) Simply put an object on the back of the frame from Step One to balance it, I was able to do this by simply putting a multi-tool on the base of the frame (See first picture).

2.) After building the horizontal segment from this step you can go and contruct a balancing leg attached to the horizontal segment. (See second picture) To do the Second way, you just have to assemble a meccano piece that uses a bracket as a base and use any additional pieces to brace the balancing leg to the main structure.

Step 3: Step THREE

Now you can go and attach the material you want to use for your background. In mine I just used some regular paper and some paperclips attached to the paper and the top meccano segments.

When you go and set up the paper, you might want to put a sheet underneith the bases of the background frame, so the background covers as much area as possible (useful when you use green screen material). By using a paperclip or magnetic clip you might be able to reuse them in another project becuase they are not permanently fastened to the structre. The paper I used can be recycled or used to write on if I need it sometime in the future.

It is important when using traditional, regular colored paper that you go by the wide side of the paper when you attach it onto the frame.



Epilog Challenge

Participated in the
Epilog Challenge