Lightsphere Flash Diffusers Review
Keywords: flash, studio, lighting, filter, guides, tips, gary_fong, lightsphere
2nd session
Not in the best of moods, my youngest granddaughter decided for the dining room to inspect the Magic Kingdom castle. With incredible dexterity she pulled from the rear box each and all of the diminute characters and was set to create her own story, fully focused, completely oblivious to my presence, even with the monster flash attachment to my camera. The perfect model.
Diffused flash, using a single SB-800 with its own dome for comparison with the Lightsphere II CLEAR and CLOUD.
This series was made with the Nikon D2X but, assuming more subject mobility the lens was changed for a 35-70mm f/2.8D AF and ISO was pumped up to 200. Apertures changed from f/2.8 to f/4.8 in this better and more uniformly lit room. The flash was optimistically set to i-TTL|BL because of some ambient light coming in. Once more, images presented below, except for the last one, have no correction of levels and curves.
SB-800 with its own cloudy diffuser
The left side image was shot with the light bounced from the ceiling at 90°
The right hand side one, with speedlight at 60° into the subject to avoid shadows.
SB-800 with Lightsphere II CLEAR
Left: Bounced upwards with no inverted dome
Right: Forward at 0° with inverted dome on
SB-800 with Lightsphere II CLOUD
Left: Bounced upwards at 90° with no inverted dome
Right: Forward with inverted dome on, at 0° from the lens axis
Image with adjusted levels and curves, made with CLOUD Lightsphere, without dome, straight up at 90°
"Mommy, do we REALLY have to leave?"
Originally written on November 2, 2012
Last updated on December 31, 2020
More articles that might interest you
G
3 comments
Art Hopkins (artnik99) on April 24, 2014
very informative articles. good future references, art
Gary Worrall (glxman) on April 19, 2014
Great review JRP! Thank you, I'm the "photographic dinosaur' here, haven't had a "real" flash for nearly 40 years, then I had a couple of Metz 60's with lead acid battery packs, how things have changed Just purchased an SB700, wow! What a steep learning curve I have ahead of me, been looking at the Gary Fong Light-sphere for a while now, not sure if I will really need the whole kit though Regards, Gary
Zita Kemeny (zkemeny) on September 2, 2013
JRP a very good article. I like the idea with the text on paper which gives details on how was the photo done. Good article as usual :-)