How's this background?

I picked up a $15 piece of fabric from Walmart for portrait background test. I like the color and tone, but untill start shooting with it, I find it is quite 'busy'. Anyway, I try my best to use longer lens to throw the BG out of focus, choose contrast color between subject's clothes and BG filter. Still, I am not sure if it will work. Here's couple samples...

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There's a little bit too much going on for my liking but i'm impressed with how crease-free you've managed to keep the bg. How did you hang it? what type of material is it?

Maybe it's just the fact that you've tested it with child portraits - they are usually best kept simple. I'd say defininately try moving the subject further from the bg, use a longer lens and enhance the blur in ps if necessary.

To be honest...it really isn't all that bad!

Like the others have said, that doesn't look too bad. They could both do with being a little more OOF, but I think I prefer the second - maybe it's the contrast of colours that does it for me.

(I didn't know they still sold fabric with this sort of pattern on it - looks like it's left over from the 70's - you did well finding it!)

It's not bad, esp if you can get your DOF a bit narrower.

I like the shots. How did you place your flash units and what camera settings did you use?

You'll probably learn more if you try to work it out by looking carefully at the shadows... take your best guess and someone will tell you if you're correct

I'd guess he bounced the 580 directly off the roof and had the 430 45deg to the left slightly higher than the camera? I have the same setup (580 and 420) but my shots look so flat....I will post tomorrow for some advice..(late here in Australia)
Ray

I seem to remember that he has a home made softbox that he uses with 580EX. So, I would say soft box with 580EX on camera left and 430 as the hair light on camera right.

The shots are not bad at all, and I do like the second one better. May be it's because the BG was OOF more. Considering the cost of the BG, you did a great job. I seem to remember that you take studio portrait shots in the garage. You definitely will need if you place the subject farther away from BG and use a longer lens.

i agree with everone here. try and get your subject farther from the bg. the blur with blend the colors of the fabric together and look less distracting.

Thanks for everyone's feedbacks. I post couple more pictures to show my setup, hope that could answer some of your questions.

#3 shows the garage and my home made gadgets. The positions of the lights maybe a bit differents in the actual shots, but you got the idea. This is my first test using a back drop, have been using that plain white wall for a while, and it starts to get a little 'bored'. Most of the my photo subjects are yong kids, lots of times I would have some props in their hands to keep them quiet and still, and I prefer to shoot f5.6-f8. Maybe time for me to buy a real back drop

#4 is my favorite of the shoot, just like everyone suggesting here, longer lens and larger lens openning did the trick.

#3

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#4 is superb! - I think it works really well with those settings - now how much did you say you were selling that fabric for?

Lotto, are you using your flash units in the softboxes or are they dedicated lights? Also, what sort of hairlight and kicker do you use? I am very interested as you mentioned they are home made and I need to say as much $$$ as possible....Saving for an L one day

Thx TJ, once you visit a fabric store, you will find something nice that you like in there

rayzorb, all my lights are AA or AAA powered flashes. Like the others noticed already, the 580 is in a 24x36" SB, the 430 is in used with a 18x18" small SB for the kicker. For the BG and hairlight, i use couple of the cheap wireless slave flash--http://www.ritzcamera.​com/product/531660769.​htm. If you are comfortable working with metal and have some basic tools, you could made all sorts of light modifiers too. Nothing against the real studio setups, but I like to learn the fundamentals before I invest in them.

Thanks again for looking.