I gave a quick presentation last night at the Chester County Camera Club. I showed some simple and more complex lighting modifiers that can be used with regular Speedlights in order to get nice lighting results in your photographs.
The strobes that I use are the (now discontinued) SB-800 and SB-600 flash units. I fire them using the SU-800 commander, but if you have a D80 or better you can use can also use the on board flash to trigger the remote speedlights.
The flash reflector card that I was using is the Demb Flip It. This works by bouncing the light off of the ceiling, while reflecting some of it forward directly onto the subject. I have and recommend the big (4″ x 4″) size. There are a lot of nice examples and instructions on his website.
The flash diffuser that I was using is the Gary Fong Lightsphere. This gives a very nice softbox look to the light by diffusing it all around the room. I really like the light that I get from this and use it often, even though many people love to call it an overpriced piece of tupperware! Again he has lots of examples and instructions on how to use it on his website.
I prefer the lightsphere most of the time. The only drawback is that you lose about 2 stops of light using this, so you usually only want to use the lightsphere for a few (1-3) people that aren’t too far (10-12 feet) from the speedlight. For larger groups or longer distances I’ll opt for the flip-it.
For when you have more time, you can get the best results from using an umbrella or softbox. You don’t need large studio strobes to use these either, the typical Nikon speedlight is more powerful then the entry level Alien Bee B400 flash.
All you need to get started is a lightstand, an umbrella head and a basic umbrella. You can also use a softbox without the hassle of having to deal with a speedring. The Westcott Apollo line of softboxes are designed to work like an umbrella, and come in 16″, 28″ and 50″ sizes. I have the 28″ one.
There are lots of great places to learn more about lighting and off camera flash on the Internet that I have found very useful. Here are a few of my favorite sites:
- David Hobby’s Stobist Blog
- Using SB-800 with softboxes
- How to use Nikon Stobes as Wireless Slaves
- Joe McNally’s Blog
There’s also a new Nikon DVD called “Hands-on Guide to Creative Lighting” with Joe McNally and Bob Krist, this is very informative.
I also keep a list of equipment that I use here on my blog.
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