Flash Diffusion

[Don Hoey]

Great link Lello. Something easy to make for about £1:50 for a couple if you go for the foam version.

I bought some of this in black that I cut and glued to the top section of my tripod legs. Keeps your hands warm when using tripod outdoors in cold weather. 2mm thick and its called Darico FOAMIES. As Christine says it comes in loads of colours from a craft shop.

Don

[mcliu]

Wow, I have learned quite a lot today, got so many links(interesting ).Thanks to Don Hoey ,Stephen Fox & of course lello.Deep inside I know I have to keep coming back to learn more.This is my "referance point" .BTW, Lello finally I succeeded in making " Home made ring flash".God I was so excited that I just could not believe my own eye when I saw the images.To be true to you,I used Jonney walker(Black label) bottle placed on the golden reflecting surface with "tabletop globe" as a touch for class. Light was evenly spreaded.Reflections were well contolled ( I think that is the hardest test one can put you into).Infact the texture too have come to very commandable level.I use to do lot of "photoshop work" to rectify my images.But after this I am convert.Infact my local kodak outlet personel also shocked to know that my "that image has no PS work ".I think you are going to get "more follower" in near future.Now at the same breath let me thank to all the members of this forum for all the pains and labours you all are going through will not go wasted.It will be remembered through the excellent and the brillient pictures that will be produced through the knowdage you provide.That is the 'ovation" for you all.Thank you all once again

[Lello]

Hi Mcliu
I'm glad to hear that you are leaning and enjoying it here on WPF. I'm going on holiday for two weeks, and when get back I expect see some shots taken with your ring flash.
Regards
Lello

[Don Hoey]

Hi Mcliu,

Nice to hear you are having a bit of fun with your flash.

Don

[Gidders]

As some of you will know when I'm not taking photographs I go dancing modern jive - see me on youtube. Well last night I went to a new venue opening. I'd said to the organisers that I would take my camera and take a few snaps for their website/facebook etc. rather than use the on camera flash, I took my Metz CT45-4 along with the idea that I could bounce off the ceiling and use the forward facing inbuilt slave for infill. I thought the results I got were a bit disappointing. Fortunately I was shooting in RAW and these have had fairly heavy doses of "fill light" applied in Lightroom but the shadows, particularly in the background, are still much harsher than I would have liked.

I think the problem was that the ceiling was quite a high dome so I wasn't getting much bounce, and too much in fill from the slave (the power of which is not adjustable) I did try a few shots with the slave off but these just tended to be a bit under exposed. I've had this problem before as ceilings in dance halls tend to be high.

This got me thinking about diffuser attachments, and reading the threads here the Stofen seems to get a lot of mentions. I'm just not sure how much benefit that it would give in the sort of rooms that I will be shooting in without much ceiling bounce factor. The alternative would appear to be something from the Lumiquest range but their products don't seem to have as much a following.

The comparison that Foxy posted

Originally Posted by Canis Vulpes

I have been looking for local stofen supplier when I found this comparison between two Stofen, Lumiquest and direct flash.

http://www.toddwalker.net/e20/flashtest/

is quite instructive but he is working a a room with a low ceiling so not that comparable to my situation.

I've had a go at mocking up something like the Lumiquest midi bouncer and will post pics and results in the next post but has anyone any thoughts on which way I should go?

[Gidders]

Following on from my post above, I used some textured old english white mount card to make something like the Lumiquest midi bouncer.

The reflector is 8" along the top edge, 5" along the back edge and ~4.5" deep. Tests showed that I was loosing ~ 2 stops compared to direct flash, but leaving the Metz on Auto and it seems to get the exposure about right. I did have to adjust the white balance from the flash setting of 5900K to 5200K - I guess because my card is not true white.

[yelvertoft]

Clive,

Firtly, I'd like to congratulate you on your dancing. The pair of you in the shopping mall are clearly having a lot of fun, it shows in spades. Not a bad pair of movers either.

On the matter of diffuser's, if you're bouncing off the ceiling I don't think it will make a lot of difference, except losing you power, if you use a diffuser. The home made Lumiquest seems to be doing a good job and as long as your gun has the ooomph to cope with it then I think you'll get better results than trying to bounce from an unfeasibly high ceiling.

In the 2nd picture you've attached, the bloke in the orange shirt and his partner have a great poise.

[Gidders]

Originally Posted by yelvertoft

Clive,

Firtly, I'd like to congratulate you on your dancing. The pair of you in the shopping mall are clearly having a lot of fun, it shows in spades. Not a bad pair of movers either.

Thanks Duncan - that was taken ~ two years ago so hopefully an even better mover now

Had a go with my improvised Lumiquest on Tuesday evening. While its still obviously flash photography, and the shots are record shorts not works of art, I think the results are better

[yelvertoft]

Clive,

Just been reading elsewhere about another technique to reduce the harsh flash issues you found on your first attempt. The suggestion was to set the camera to manual mode and adjust the settings to give -1 stop exposure under the ambient lighting conditions, bumping up the ISO if needed. The general ambient lighting will probably not be changing that much in your hall, so it shouldn't be necessary to tweak it that much during your photo session. Having fixed these settings to give -1 stop underexposed from ambient, fit the flashgun and set it to TTL auto mode and use the flash to provide the additional lighting needed to bring up the 1 stop needed to get the exposure right. The flashgun will need to vary its output depending on camera to subject distance, hence the flash needs to be set to TTL auto. By balancing ambient with flash this way it apparently reduces the harshness of the flash seen on your first images and softens the shadows.

I've had no direct experience of using this technique, but I saw it described as a solution to exactly the kind of issues you're having and thought it may be of use to you or someone else.

Regards,

Duncan

[miketoll]

When I had a similar Metz I found the foreward facing flash fill in flash tended to overdo it a bit as well so attached the wide angle adapter supplied with the gun to the secondary flash which helped. An alternative would be to diffuse the fill in tube with the traditional bit of tissue paper.