Lighting and backdrop help!!!

[leanne]

I bought a muslin backdrop off of ebay and it's very thin, you can practically see through it. I hung a white sheet behind it to try to make it brighter but it's just not what I expected. Everytime I take pictures it seems grey. I have 2 umbrella lights, maybe I need more?? to blow it out??
This picture of my son doesn't seem very bright??
Any suggestions!!
Thankyou

[mervyntattoo]

Think you are exposing for the sheet not your son, take your exposure reading from his face, everything will then be correct.

[Geneo]

mervyntato is correct. It looks like it's metering on the whole scene and not just your son. You can either a)spot meter on your son's face or b)meter it like you did but try an EV of +1 and +2.

That said, I can't see the EXIF data. If you shot this in manual mode, you set the exposure too low for the flash as shot. If you set the camera for a normal flash you may not have taken into account that you need to open up a stop or two for the loss of light by using an umbrella (just like when using bounce flash you have to take the total distance the flash travels AND about 2 stops light loss into account).

No problem though. A dark photo simply means that it's underexposed- you need more light... either by increasing the exposure or you need more light.

[leanne]

Thankyou
I will retake it this weekend, thankyou for your help. :)