[Railroader]

[ The flash photo wedding thread that Jawbone54 started inspired me to finally buy a Gary Fong LIGHTSPHERE-II DIFFUSER - CLOUD from Gary Fong - BLOG & E-Store Links (I was going to post in the thread, but decided to write a long review instead.) ]

I like it. It works as well as I could expect. The device is a very simple operation. It is two parts, a lower attachment that slips over your external flash unit, and an upper piece that goes inside the lower attachment. The upper piece looks like a small plastic bowl and it acts as a reflector and diffuser for the flash that is emitted from the external flash unit. The attachment is a snug fit and will not slip off. It is also made out of a very soft pliable plastic resin and is unlikely to mar, mark, or scratch your flash unit.

The Lightpshere II Cloud on my Canon 430EX:


The two pieces that compose the Lightspere II Cloud:


And here are some simulated results. I tried to mimic conditions of wedding party guests in a large reception hall up against a wall. High ceiling (bad for bounce flash), and a close wall behind to capture harsh flash shadow. My daughter graciously donated her Barbie dolls time for this review.

Straight flash aimed at subjects:
As you can see, harsh distracting shadows behind subjects. Typical "snapshot" look.


Bounce flash aimed off distant ceiling:
Subjects are not lit enough. If I adjusted for subjects then everything behind them would be over exposed.


Gary Fong Lightsphere II Cloud:
The right Barbie's hat cast a shadow on the other's face, but the result is much better than straight flash and much better than bounced flash.


I didn't adjust any levels or color balance in the photos. The camera's white balance was set for "FLASH". I did crop the pictures to eliminate distractions.

[design219]

Thanks for sharing your review, however I'm sure you would have less soft results with full size people. Diffusion is not as important as relative size of the diffused source to the subject. A bare light bulb will be soft close to a small doll as it is relatively as big as a large studio softbox would be to a real person.

[ghporter]

Thanks for taking the plunge, Railroader. This looks promising.

[Railroader]

Originally Posted by design219 

Thanks for sharing your review, however I'm sure you would have less soft results with full size people.

Agreed, but remember, the bare flash would be more harsh as well. And the difference between the small scale example is dramatic. It will be more so with actual full-sized people.

Originally Posted by design219 

Diffusion is not as important as relative size of the diffused source to the subject. A bare light bulb will be soft close to a small doll as it is relatively as big as a large studio softbox would be to a real person.

Do you use a flash close enough to people that it appears soft? No.

I'd post results of pictures I took with my family, but I was burned once and it won't happen again. I assure you, the results were as dramatic as with the dolls.

[zro]

Originally Posted by Railroader 

Agreed, but remember, the bare flash would be more harsh as well. And the difference between the small scale example is dramatic. It will be more so with actual full-sized people.

Now, I'm not trying to stir your bees nest, but I think he's saying that the before and after shots look very similar due entirely to the relative size of the subject to the light source. I see nothing dramatic between the two other than background shadows, myself. They look practically the same.

Originally Posted by Railroader 

Do you use a flash close enough to people that it appears soft? No.

What? He didn't say anything about your distance to the subject. Where are you getting this? If you're just getting defensive I really don't see a need to be.

Originally Posted by Railroader 

I'd post results of pictures I took with my family, but I was burned once and it won't happen again. I assure you, the results were as dramatic as with the dolls.

Very understandable and I don't blame you a bit.


I was kinda hoping you'd say you were blown away by the results. I've tried all sorts of homemade bounces and diffusers but nothing looked as good as bouncing off a low enough ceiling. Not that they have a model that fits my strobe, mind you. Just looking for inspiration to try something different.

[design219]

Yeah, it's really a mater of relative size of the light source. Direct sunlight gives harsh shadows because the source is "relatively" small on the earth's surface. Overcast days yield soft shadows because the same light source is now much larger...the size of the sky. Of course if you were really close to the sun, it would give a very soft shadow as well, as it would now be a relatively large light source.

The principle is the same with these type of diffusers. They are a little bit larger than the strobe alone, but not much. The farther away from the subject you are, the smaller the relative size is, thus harsher shadows.

Possible advantages are, again, it does make a slightly larger light source, and there will be a very little bit of light bounced from all over (walls, ceilings, furniture, etc.) as the light is so scattered.

[MacosNerd]

I also purchased the Gary Fong Diffuser. I've not had the time or opportunity to use it for many shots but the limited use has shown promise. Softening the harsh blare of the flash in a number of shots. I've not had too much use with using it to bounce the light on a ceiling. From the video that came with the diffuser, I'm expecting some of the shadows particularly on the face to be reduced when using it. Over all I'm pleased with the product and I think its worth the small price he's charging for it.

[Railroader]

Originally Posted by zro 

Now, I'm not trying to stir your bees nest, but

Huh?!?!

Originally Posted by zro 

I think he's saying that the before and after shots look very similar due entirely to the relative size of the subject to the light source.

I got that, hence my first comment to him.

Originally Posted by zro 

I see nothing dramatic between the two other than background shadows, myself. They look practically the same.

Really?!?! I think they are quite dramatically different.



Look at the shadows on the wall. The flat faces in the direct flash and the more dimensional faces in the diffused shot. The light is higly reflected back in the direct flash and more flattering in the diffused side.

Originally Posted by zro 

What? He didn't say anything about your distance to the subject. Where are you getting this?

From this statement:

Originally Posted by design219

A bare light bulb will be soft close to a small doll as it is relatively as big as a large studio softbox would be to a real person.

See the word "close"? That indicated distance.

Originally Posted by zro 

If you're just getting defensive I really don't see a need to be.

That's a bit of a passive aggressive statement? a bit assumptive.

Originally Posted by zro 

Very understandable and I don't blame you a bit.

I was kinda hoping you'd say you were blown away by the results. I've tried all sorts of homemade bounces and diffusers but nothing looked as good as bouncing off a low enough ceiling. Not that they have a model that fits my strobe, mind you. Just looking for inspiration to try something different.

I am VERY impressed with the results.

[Railroader]

Originally Posted by design219 

Yeah, it's really a mater of relative size of the light source. Direct sunlight gives harsh shadows because the source is "relatively" small on the earth's surface. Overcast days yield soft shadows because the same light source is now much larger...the size of the sky. Of course if you were really close to the sun, it would give a very soft shadow as well, as it would now be a relatively large light source.

Originally Posted by design219 

The principle is the same with these type of diffusers. They are a little bit larger than the strobe alone, but not much. The farther away from the subject you are, the smaller the relative size is, thus harsher shadows.

Possible advantages are, again, it does make a slightly larger light source,

But the major difference between this diffuser and other diffusers is this:

Originally Posted by design219 

and there will be a very little bit of light bounced from all over (walls, ceilings, furniture, etc.) as the light is so scattered.

This is the key here. It is not only a nice diffused direct flash, but also a very effective bounce flash. the problem with bounce flash is that you can get dark shadowing under the eyes. The problem with direct flash is you get flattening of the facial features. With this diffuser you get both bounce and direct diffused flash. You lose the harshness of direct flash and gain the benefits of bounce flash.

[iMOTOR]

It looks like a melted piece of Tupperware.

[I'mDaMac]

It keeps your veggies fresh while on the road!

[jebjeb]

I have been using a LightSphere for about 6 months now and am a big fan. Always use it at the weddings I do. They do cause your flash to use a lot of juice so your recycle times on the flash go up plus the number of shots with the batteries goes down. This is one reason to go with a 580 compared to a 430.

Also very useful outside. Tilt the flash down so it is pointing like normal at the subject. The lid of the diffuser will be pointing at the subject now. I find that either +0 or down to -1.5 compensation on the flash works well to fill the eye sockets and take away the worst of the shadows on the face.

Inside for a reception or similar, often it is necessary to put the camera in Manual rather than Av and set an appropriate aperture and shutter speed. I often just shoot wide open (1.2, 1.4 or 2.8 depending on the lens I am using) and a shutter speed of somewhere between 1/30 or 1/60 depending on how dark it is and how much ambient light I want to show in the photo. I generally under expose and then push the photo up a stop or so in Aperture.

One thing that one should be careful of is that it doesn't completely eliminate shadows from an off centre flash. A rotating flash bracket (I use a Tiffen Press-T) for when shooting portrait is still pretty helpful if you have some close backgrounds behind the subject.

[ghporter]

Originally Posted by Railroader 

I am VERY impressed with the results.

So am I, but I think those results would be more obvious to others if the background were less bland. By showing that you get more background detail with the attachment than with a direct flash, you'd be able to show how well it distributes light.

jebjeb points out that the diffuser uses "a lot of juice." That's because, like all diffusers, the Lightsphere spreads the light out, so it takes more light energy to get the exposure you're after and thus more power to recharge the flash. Because of that, you get more light on parts of the picture OTHER than the subject in the foreground. I don't think that a lot of people are picking up on this important factor, in part because your example pictures don't demonstrate background details that would come out because of the more diffuse lighting.

Fong's page has a good example of that:

In the direct shot, the background is almost completely gone, which makes the couple in th foreground look well-lit but pasted on the uninteresting background. Worse, the groom's black jacket blends into the background so it looks like a bad job of Photoshopping. In the other picture,the background is not only there, but you can see details in it that make it an interesting setting, and the couple looks like part of the picture. The direct shot looks like a very amateurish picture, while the diffuse shot looks like a much more professionally lit one.

I don't doubt that these two images are pretty idealized, but they demonstrate the difference you're seeing.

[TETENAL]

Originally Posted by ghporter 

In the direct shot, the background is almost completely gone, which makes the couple in th foreground look well-lit but pasted on the uninteresting background. In the other picture,the background is not only there, but you can see details in it that make it an interesting setting, and the couple looks like part of the picture.

With that thing on the flash has less power. That means the camera has to compensate with a longer exposure which makes it pick up more of the ambient light. That contributes to most of the difference you are seeing in those two pictures. I'm not saying that a diffuser is totally useless, but you could get a similar result by reducing the flash's power by two stops.

[ghporter]

Originally Posted by TETENAL 

With that thing on the flash has less power. That means the camera has to compensate with a longer exposure which makes it pick up more of the ambient light. That contributes to most of the difference you are seeing in those two pictures. I'm not saying that a diffuser is totally useless, but you could get a similar result by reducing the flash's power by two stops.

Less light per watt gets onto the foreground subject, but the flash should have plenty of power to compensate. It all depends on how your camera and flash are set up; if you have a set aperture, the camera should tell the flash how much light to get on the subject, and the flash should compensate by dumping enough light — in spite of obstacles and diffusers — onto the subject to get the proper exposure. That's where the "longer recycle times" that jebjeb mentioned come in. The flash uses more energy to put out more light, so the charge circuit has to recharge longer.

[jebjeb]

Originally Posted by TETENAL 

With that thing on the flash has less power. That means the camera has to compensate with a longer exposure which makes it pick up more of the ambient light. That contributes to most of the difference you are seeing in those two pictures. I'm not saying that a diffuser is totally useless, but you could get a similar result by reducing the flash's power by two stops.

Not quite true. Very seldom does a flash put out it's full power (certainly not with a high power model like the 550 or 580 from Canon), it is only required when you are shooting big groups. The camera is exposing for the subject (in the Fong examples Glen posted it is the bride and groom) and the flash probably only needs something like 1/8 - 1/4 full power to expose that ok (all depends on the aperture). What increasing the exposure time does is, as you rightly pointed out, brighten up the background.

One must remember that pure flash exposure is only really affected by the aperture and not shutter speed. A flash lasts for bugger all (less than 1/1000th of a second) so having a shutter speed of 1/60 compared to 1/250 makes no difference to the light hitting the sensor from the flash. What does affect it is the aperture. Shooting at f4 allows twice the light in as shooting at f5.6 so therefore only half the flash power is required.

However, this is all theoretical and based on a photo lit only by the flash. We are pretty much always working with some ambient light as well. This is where the shutter speed comes into play. We can use this now to, pretty much independent of the light provided by the flash, to either brighten or darken our backgrounds. One still needs to be careful of motion blur once the shutter speed gets too slow as the flash will only "freeze" the action so much.

Changing the aperture will affect both types of lighting, flash and ambient. Shooting wide open can help the flash out a bit as it will require less power whilst also brightening up the background.

All reducing the power on the flash will do is narrow stop (amount of light) difference between the subject and the background. This is pretty much what fill flash is. Very useful it is too as I use it nearly all the time on a wedding shoot.

The benefits a diffuser brings is a more even and softer light source plus it bounces it around more contributing to that less harsh quality.

[OreoCookie]

Just a little qualifier, jebjeb: the shutter speed does matter, but only for the background-foreground contrast: a long shutter speed will leed to a `brighter' background.

Just a little comment regarding cycle times: on the Nikon side, the smaller flash actually recycles faster (both at full power, of course), because it's not as strong. I'm not sure about Canon's flashes.

[jebjeb]

Thus why I said:

Originally Posted by jebjeb 

However, this is all theoretical and based on a photo lit only by the flash. We are pretty much always working with some ambient light as well. This is where the shutter speed comes into play. We can use this now to, pretty much independent of the light provided by the flash, to either brighten or darken our backgrounds. One still needs to be careful of motion blur once the shutter speed gets too slow as the flash will only "freeze" the action so much.

Maybe I said it in to much of a round-about way

[OreoCookie]

Ok, you're right. I was focussing on the previous paragraph, but you've explained that in the next. (Although I think the two paragraphs are somewhat contradictory.)

Anywho, let's go on with the thread.