A lightbox ate my evening!

I knew I had a few hours to myself tonight so I had big plans for making in-roads on my creative to-do list...enter the lightbox...and now it's almost 10pm! What happened?!

Mostly it was distraction (I like to say I have ADOS - Attention Defecit Ooh Shiny!). I forgot to factor in that although my main challenge of the evening, making myself a pauper's lightbox from a cardboard box, wouldn't take too long playing with it and taking test photos would! Oops...but a fun oops!


Anyway here is the finished product, as rough on the eyes as sandpaper (as my aunt would say) but functional - hooray!

I used tracing paper for the side and top panels to keep the light properly diffuse but I think I need to get at least one better light. The one I was using seemed to have that yellowy cast to it. It's all a learning curve right? :) I was also wondering about playing around with coloured backgrounds... but maybe I should make sure that I can get the simplest version right first! Wish me luck!

If anyone has any tips about lightboxes and photography of books please feel free to share! I also haven't quite figured out how to stand the books up to get total flat-on views, would a hidden book stand work do you think?