Evolution of a Light box...

My Etsy shop has been closed for some time now (for a multitude of reasons) and I'm trying to get ready to reopen it.  However in looking at some of my pictures I noticed that some of them weren't the most professional looking, and the ones that were were taken by someone else.  I asked around and got some great advice from a friend in Chicago who suggested that I build a light box.  I was a little weary of doing that because Matt and I aren't in a house yet and thought of moving a giant wooden box freaked me out; then in doing some research I saw that there were a TON of simple light boxes made out of cardboard boxes and opaque shelf paper.  It seemed easy enough - so I took it on, added it to my ever growing project list and here's how it came out.

First I outlined on the box where I wanted the windows to be.  My husband went in with a box cutter and cut out the windows.  He questioned it a lot - more because he didn't think that it would be stable enough, but he finally just went with it. :-)

 My cat, Pandora, thought that this was her new house. Not entirely sure what she was hoping to accomplish since normally she jumps into a box and then jumps right back out and then back in...and so forth, but she sat there forever!

 Of course, I couldn't find opaque shelf paper, so I used clear and white tissue paper - it lets in just enough light.  To measure out the tissue paper I used the left over pieces of box from the windows and gave about an inch extra on either side of the tissue paper.

 I used white duct tape to seal off the seams.

 Matt spray painted the inside of the box white - he's not happy with how it turned out.  He keeps assuring he's going to make me a better box when we're in a house.  I keep trying to tell him that when it's flooded with light and then when I play with the pictures in Photoshop I can bring up the brightness and the seams won't show, but still apologizes for how it looks.

 To finish is I put in the windows.  Two layers of clear shelf paper (on of the outside of the window and one on the inside) and the white tissue paper in between the layers.  I decided to put the shelf paper on the inside too in case my cat decides to lay in the box again.  I can easily wipe it down that way.

I can't wait to start taking pictures with this light box and hopefully reopening my Etsy shop sometime soon.  If the weather clears this weekend I'll take the pictures outside, but if not I some lighting I can use instead and I'll take the pictures inside.  Either way, I'm starting to get things done and off my list!