{"id":17590,"date":"2013-09-18T03:40:40","date_gmt":"2013-09-18T07:40:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/neilvn.com\/tangents\/?p=17590"},"modified":"2017-08-11T21:23:53","modified_gmt":"2017-08-12T01:23:53","slug":"using-a-beauty-dish-light-modifier","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/neilvn.com\/tangents\/using-a-beauty-dish-light-modifier\/","title":{"rendered":"Thoughts on using a beauty dish (light modifier)"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Thoughts on using a beauty dish as a single light source<\/h1>\n

A beauty dish is one of those light modifiers that sound attractive just by name already. And when photographers start exploring other options than direct off-camera flash and umbrellas or a softbox, a beauty dish is usually one of the first alternate light modifiers that catches attention. Mine too. Right after I bought my first Profoto kit, I purchased a beauty dish for it and started exploring\u00a0using a beauty dish<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A beauty dish is ideally used at a closer distance for portraits, with the light “focused” on the face, creating a gradient where the light rapidly falls off between the lighter and darker areas – yet looks soft where the light is focused. But there’s more to it than that – a beauty dish is best used with a grid to help control the light. Or used with a sock, but then the beauty dish acts very much like a round softbox, and some of its specific qualities are lost.<\/p>\n

Quite a few of the softbox options for speedlights offer a way to create a beauty dish-like effect. An example is the Westcott Rapidbox – 26″ Octa Softbox<\/a>\u00a0(affiliate<\/em>), as mentioned in the\u00a0review: Westcott Rapid Box 26″ Octa Softbox<\/a>. You can take the front diffuser off and add the\u00a0Westcott 2030-DP Deflector Plate<\/a>\u00a0(affiliate<\/em>), turning it into a beauty dish of sorts. But the same limitations appear.<\/p>\n

Looking at the portrait of David above, you’ll notice a semi-circular band of light to the left. This is because, even though the light from the beauty-dish-ified softbox focuses light on him, there is light that spills from the edge of the speedlight. The detail photo of the Westcott RapidBox will explain it better …<\/p>\n

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This is how the light is spread with the deflector plate in the middle. The light is now bounced into the octa-box, giving nearly a beauty dish type of light.<\/p>\n

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However, when you move to the side, you’ll see there is direct light spilling from the speedlight. This is what caused that semi-circular band of light. Hard direct flash.<\/p>\n

This pull-back shot will show the circular spill light better. And there is also a comparison photo of the available light, with the aperture opened up to f\/4 instead of the f\/5.6 used in the final images with the softbox.<\/p>\n

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With the final images of David, I was able to use that spill light for effect, by controlling the composition.<\/p>\n

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Photo gear (or equivalents) used during this photo session<\/h2>\n