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When I started out taking portraits as a hobby, it was all about saving money. This meant buying big pieces of fabric from Walmart and hanging them on the wall with thumb tacks.Today, things are a little different. After a while my living room started to look like a competition dart room and I started taking portraits on location. I decided it was time to find a better solution. Luckily, the photography industry has just the solution: the collapsible background support stand.

Convenience
Background stands are made of two telescoping stands and a multi-section cross bar. They usually have a height capacity of about ten feet and a width of about 12 feet. They are tubular and lightweight at ten to 15 pounds, and because they’re collapsible they easily bundle up into a nice small package. One person can easily set one up in two minutes. Many come with carrying cases.

Cost
Stands can run in a wide range of costs. I got my stand on eBay for around $60. If you’re leery about buying photo gear on eBay, Adorama has a bargain stand from Giottos for about $139. I haven’t used it myself, but the specs look good.

Durability
Every stand I’ve seen is quite durable. They’re made of metal (usually aluminum) so they’re rugged. There really isn’t much in the way of moving parts to break down, so longevity isn’t really a worry. They’ll give you years of use, especially if you’re a hobby photographer.

Hanging the Backgrounds
Once you have a stand, hanging your backgrounds on it is easy. Often times backgrounds come with a sleeve on one side for hanging, but I find this to be more of a pain than it’s worth. My other love is woodworking, and one of the sayings is “You can never have enough clamps”. So one day I just grabbed a few small spring clamps from the workshop and started hanging backgrounds by clipping them to the cross bar. You can get a whole bag of them at Walmart for about five bucks.

Once you have a background stand you’ll find yourself wondering why you never bought one sooner. They really do make life easier on even a hobby photographer.