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Tangents

my choice of flash modifiers

December 13, 2007

my choice of light modifiers

Update: Here’s a video clip where I demonstrate how I use the black foamie thing to flag the light from my on-camera flash.

There is a fundamental principle in lighting :
the larger your light source, the softer your light.

Using any of the myriad of flash modifiers that are on offer, helps in achieving that – spreading the light from the on-camera Speedlight much wider, thereby creating softer light that direct flash would’ve given.  However, (and this is a big however), these flash modifiers also throw light forward.  Ultimately all flash modifiers do the same thing – they disperse a lot of light around the room, while throwing some measure of light directly forward to lift shadows under the eyes and bring a sparkle to the eyes.

That is a huge step up from using direct flash – (or poorly bounced flash.. ie, flash at 45′ or 60′ forward) – but won’t be as good as directional light.  Directional light falls onto your subject from a specific angle.  This direction can very often be carefully chosen even when you use an on-camera flash indoors.

For this candid portrait of the ring-bearer, I touched up the WB in RAW, and that’s that. Simple, and it looks just great. The light is soft, and the little guy wasn’t bothered by any direct flash … since there was NO direct flash at all.

my choice of light modifier for an on-camera flash

The way I achieve directional light from my flash is by adding what is in effect, a half-snoot on my on-camera flash.  The half-snoot (or flag) will partially block the light, and also direct it.

This piece of black foam around my Speedlight has two advantages:

1. Directional light.  I can now much more precisely direct where I want my light to come from.
2. Less annoying to others. In turning my flash to the side or to point behind me, I would risk blasting other people directly in the face with flash. This piece of black foam keeps that from happening.  I now direct my flash over people’s heads, and I don’t blitz people in their faces with direct flash when they stand next to me or behind me.

I also very often when shooting in tungsten light, use a filter on my flash to bring the cold light of the flash closer to the warmer tones of tungsten light.

I simply stick a piece of gel over the head of my Speedlight with some gaffer’s tape.
It is low-tech, but it works.

By gelling my flash for tungsten I change the grungy orange backgrounds to a more pleasing warm tone.

The gel used in the image of the baby above, was full CTS.  I keep my camera’s WB to Tungsten.  And in post-production I fine-tune the WB, since by bouncing my flash, it picks up an additional color from the walls and ceiling.  The gel shown in the illustration here is 1/2 CTS.  I then keep my WB of my camera to 3800 K, which is still much closer to Tungsten, than the 5400K of flash.

The black half-snoot / flag that I add to my Speedlight is just as simple.  It’s a piece of thin black foam bought from an arts store, and then cut smaller.

I keep the piece of black foam tied to my Speedlight with a hair band that I stole from my daughter.  Yup, low-tech and simple … and it works!

It can also be manipulated and shaped, as shown in this updated post on how I use this flash modifier.  Be sure to read this updated page as well!

Also check out this follow-up article on why I chose a piece of black foam to flag my flash, rather than using something white.

And that is the flash modifier I most often use. Total cost is less than $2.00

If you want something more elegant and less home-made, then there is the Spinlight 360

And there they are – the only light modifiers that I use when I use on-camera Speedlights.
In my work as an wedding photographer in New Jersey / New York, I often do use off-camera lighting, whether Speedlights or Q-flashes.  But with on-camera strobes, these are the only light modifiers I use.  And they are all I really need when working indoors.

 

 

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