Question about Diffusers

[jkha]

Hi,

I am going to a graduation tomorrow which is outside and at night.
I have a 430ex II flash and garyfong lightsphere

I was wondering if I should take the pictures with the diffuser? or without?
and if i take it with the lightsphere should i put on the inverted dome also?


Thanks

[Jojie]

did you say outside? whenever I take photo outside and have nothing to bounce back with I use straight through... I dont' have garyfongs gadgets (because if i need to reflect things back I get a photo paper and mount it on my flash and bounce it off there) and if i am outdoors I don't use any.. and instead of tilting it 45 degrees or something I jsut don't but I do play with the power settings in flash..

my newbie opion is all.. :d

[jkha]

so should i just aim the flash straight at the subject?

[sybren]

You can take a sheet of A4 paper, and attach it to your strobe with a rubber band. The trick to softer light is to make the illuminating area as large as possible, as seen from your subject. So move it in close and make it large, and the light will look quite good.

[Gary Norman]

I've been very happy with the Gary Fong cloud light sphere in low light situations, bars and the like.

[OsmosisStudios]

I would just use a fairly weak head-on flash for fill.

[JAD40]

You can bounce flash off of someone's white shirt :P I'm sure there will be a few people dressed up in a long sleeve button down

[GadgetRick]

Honestly, I don't use diffusers like what you're talking about. I bought them and was using them but, once I really understood you need to make a BIGGER light source to properly diffuse a flash, I just started bouncing my flash indoors. I think diffusers are more trouble than they're worth.

Here's an example from the other night at weigh-ins for a fight I shot. Inside a small hotel room, just bouncing the flash off the wall/ceiling. It's plenty diffused.

[OsmosisStudios]

Originally Posted by GadgetRick

Here's an example from the other night at weigh-ins for a fight I shot. Inside a small hotel room, just bouncing the flash off the wall/ceiling. It's plenty diffused.

It's also the wrong temperature.

[peeperita]

Originally Posted by jkha

Hi,

I am going to a graduation tomorrow which is outside and at night.
I have a 430ex II flash and garyfong lightsphere

I was wondering if I should take the pictures with the diffuser? or without?
and if i take it with the lightsphere should i put on the inverted dome also?


Thanks

since it's outdoors and there's nothing to bounce off of, take it with you and leave the lid on...it will give you nice soft shadowing...you're going to have to tweak your flash output a bit before your satisfied, so make sure you test shot a few times with a willing companion......remember, as the distance varies, you'll have to dial up and down on the flash..too far out, you'll take the lid off...oh, and point it dead at or just above your subject...

good luck!

peeper