Strobist softbox - Are these any good?

wippers · 9 Mar 2012

Hi All - I have a couple of speedlights at home that I have been playing around with and would like to soften the light somewhat. At the Focus show on Monday I saw a number of stands with the softboxes and brackets for use with flash guns. I have found these on the Elemental site which look good value for money.
Has anyone got any advise etc?

http://www.studio-flash.com/40cm-x-40cm-flashgun-softbox.html

Thanks for looking.

Gareth

GDHphotography · 9 Mar 2012

yep, they are fine, check out viewfinder, they do a fabulous softbox/ beauty dish for speedlights, touch dearer but awesome bit of kit

Marcus Geezer · 9 Mar 2012

Have you tried brollies at all? Bit cheaper and the light is awesome. Good starter for 10 if you are getting into strobist work.

wippers · 9 Mar 2012

Marcus Geezer said:
Have you tried brollies at all? Bit cheaper and the light is awesome. Good starter for 10 if you are getting into strobist work.

I have a brolly for my main studio flash head but thought the softboxes provided a softer light?
I'm pretty new to this so happy for advise.

Garry Edwards · 9 Mar 2012

The softness or otherwise of the light is all about size, not the choice of softbox or umbrella.

It's actually about relative size, i.e. the size of the light source relative to the size of the subject. If you move the light source closer to the subject it becomes bigger in relative terms, so becomes softer (it makes other changes too, but let's just deal with size).

Those tiny toy softboxes for hotshoe flashguns do very little, unless they light and the subject are very close together.

wippers · 11 Mar 2012

Garry Edwards said:
The softness or otherwise of the light is all about size, not the choice of softbox or umbrella.

It's actually about relative size, i.e. the size of the light source relative to the size of the subject. If you move the light source closer to the subject it becomes bigger in relative terms, so becomes softer (it makes other changes too, but let's just deal with size).

Those tiny toy softboxes for hotshoe flashguns do very little, unless they light and the subject are very close together.

Cheers for the info Garry. These are likely to be use in my garage so distance from subject to light is something like 2 feet. Is this close enough for them to be of use, or would you still steer clear?

Gareth

Garry Edwards · 11 Mar 2012

wippers said:
Cheers for the info Garry. These are likely to be use in my garage so distance from subject to light is something like 2 feet. Is this close enough for them to be of use, or would you still steer clear?

Gareth

There's an old saying "If the light isn't in your way it isn't close enough" and it's often true, but a working distance of just 2 ft is very close and will cause practical problems, especially if the light is directly in front of the camera and high - which is (should be) a common position.

In reality, you're likely to have the lights quite a bit further away, which means that they won't be big enough if you want the lighting to be even reasonably soft.

wippers · 11 Mar 2012

Garry Edwards said:
There's an old saying "If the light isn't in your way it isn't close enough" and it's often true, but a working distance of just 2 ft is very close and will cause practical problems, especially if the light is directly in front of the camera and high - which is (should be) a common position.

In reality, you're likely to have the lights quite a bit further away, which means that they won't be big enough if you want the lighting to be even reasonably soft.

Cheers Garry. Think I'll be having a re-think and a bit more reading up on studio lighting before I part with any hard-earned cash.

BTW, I had a listen to one of your seminars at Focus and have to say I learned quite a lot considering the short length of presentation. Didn't realise how much you can get out of a single light and reflector.

Gareth