Diffuser tryouts! Which do you prefer?

[viewwing]

I believe many of us would have thought about what diffusers we want to go into... cost is an issue, and size of the item... even battery life for the matter... cause most diffuser will "decrease" the power of the flash. So i thought of sharing some photos which i took of my little bear to show the effects of using different flash combination.

I did a search in the forms search engine and didn't find something like this... so in case i bobo... moderators please remove this thread... my bad :kok:

Setting of the Camera and Flash are all in MANUAL.

Gear used: E510, 15-54mm, FL-50, Foreverfriends bear.
Setting: 54mm, F3.5, shutter 1/60. GN 14. (14 was the best lighting for the setting. else its either too bright or too dark on the "baseline picture").
Location: In my computer room. (white celling)


Here i'll start with the BASELINE picture So we can compare it against the rest.

This is the usual bounce "Turn up the flash and bounce it off the celling".

Next, the flash is turned to the side (so u see the short end of the head instead)

Basically there's not much difference between the 2.

 

[viewwing]

Here we have a Flat front with the "Tip" of a bounce card. Those we see with a very small tip pasted at the top of the flash head?

Flat front with bounce tip.

Side with bounce tip.

Looking at the this comparing with the Baseline... i notice that its a little brighter at the top portion of the bear...

 

[viewwing]

Now with a Bounce card. Its the one made from plastic PVC

similiarly with the Flat front.

And turned to the side

Woh... its all overexposed... which means in this case more light has been projected to the front portion and the back is also lighted. And i guess if the flash is set at TTL i'll need lesser flash power. Hmmmm

 

[viewwing]

Now with a Gary Fong Light Sphere II (clear).

This is with the flash head turned to the side... which was recommended by the man himself.

Well comparing this to the Baseline. I would say it has a more "rounded" and 3d effect...

Well... being a cheapo... i tried to DIY one similiar with a NISSIN cup noodle (try to emulate the Cloud version)

ok... doesn't look any different from the baseline picure leh... experiemented liao... don't bother trying...

 

[viewwing]

with the never say die attitude... i try again.. thinking that with TTL the noodle cup will be better...

well... other than being better exposed... don't have the 3d feeling leh... so don't kid myself already... time to throw away the failed product...

Last but not the lease... i tried to use some orange color construction paper, taped it to the bounce card and see if i can "warm" up the picture a little.

Well its definely more Orangy... maybe next time try with a yellow paper or something...

So far i've only have this few diffusers... and personally... i think for events.. i'll stick to the bounce card... for portraits, i think the lightsphere is really something... just to share my opinion... I hope this helps fellow newbies when deciding which diffuser to go into.

If anyone has a stofen or other diffusers please share it in this thread for all in CS to benefit!!

Cheers!!

 

[Oly5050]

Now with a Bounce card. Its the one made from plastic PVC

similiarly with the Flat front.

And turned to the side

Woh... its all overexposed... which means in this case more light has been projected to the front portion and the back is also lighted. And i guess if the flash is set at TTL i'll need lesser flash power. Hmmmm

Thanks for doing this. I think ur findings are right. I have a DIY laminated bounce card and I think that it tends to pale things out.

 

[LittleWolf]

I'm not sure that the little teddy bear is a good model here - the face is pretty flat, with no extending nose or recessed eyes where shadows would be obvious.

Looking at the background though, the bounce flash against the wall/the ceiling is by far the best diffusion method - it is the only method that doesn't produce ugly shadows of the chair. After that, the quality of light goes IMHO downhill, and the more fancy/expensive the gadget is you attach to the flash, the worse.

 

[viewwing]

I'm not sure that the little teddy bear is a good model here - the face is pretty flat, with no extending nose or recessed eyes where shadows would be obvious.

Looking at the background though, the bounce flash against the wall/the ceiling is by far the best diffusion method - it is the only method that doesn't produce ugly shadows of the chair. After that, the quality of light goes IMHO downhill, and the more fancy/expensive the gadget is you attach to the flash, the worse.

maybe i should have gotten a bear with sharper nose... do note that the flash is in manual setting. so power of the light when using different items will have some + and -. I thought that the GF really gave the most "soft" feeling. And the bounce card will help to reduce the power for every fire due to the fact that it bounce it front and up too.

 

[catchlights]

this test will not really justify the final results, unless you on interested to shoot all the things in this size only, if you shooting more on human, use a real person to do a series of test to get better final results

and do note different Diffusers work best on different kind of situation, so not really you can find have a Diffuser which is all rounder.

 

[JWT]

Hello:

We have been using SoftLite Diffuser for all our flashlight photography.
If you are keen to try out, I will be glad to arrange for you to try out.
In the mean time, take a look at the following two links:
http://www.passionphotographers.com
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8494974@N06/
The link to flickr shows photos taken with the SoftLite Diffuser.

William
Email: jwteo8@gmail.com