I have never been wild about artificial light. Back in the day when I could not afford it I was forced to work exclusively with natural daylight, then, later, when the need to lean how to use artificial light became clear to me in order to master it, I had a new reason not to bother with it. But the truth is, artificial light can not only allow photography to happen in conditions where natural light is simply missing, but it can also be beautiful in ways that only crafting and tweaking can please a dork such as myself. So I ventured into looking at tutorials for do-it-yourself lighting alternatives. Something that appealed to me was the softbox; a device that takes harsh flash or strobe light and softens it, making it seems as if it is a much larger diffused light source that comes from a much broader direction (much like the thing that a cloudy overcast day does to sunlight). The reason for doing this is the lack of shadows (as opposed to a more directional light) in spite of it still being relatively bright.
I found that the key behind this concept is to place the flash (or light source in general, because a flashlight will also work) within a box that does not need to be very deep but wide, in fact the wider it is the larger the surface that the light is coming from will appear to be. The inside of the box is covered with tin foil (in order to make sure no light is wasted and all of it eventually makes its way out rather than being absorbed by the cardboard walls) and the opening covered by a somewhat transparent piece of white cloth. The way things end up working out is this …the cloth takes up the light, diffuses it and sends it out making it seem as if the entire surface covered by cloth is the size of the light bulb. “Pretty crazy” is what comes to mind when someone first hears about this, or maybe it was just me who thought that, but nonetheless I had to try it out. My explanation above may not be the best, so here is a link to the actual tutorial I followed.
The setup
Here’s the login behind what you see there: I used white board around the subject in order to have it bathed in light coming from all directions (yes it works). The soft box is broadcasting the light mostly on to the right side of the subject as well as behind it; the boards then reflect the extra light back at the subject. The verdict? It works! Note: It is worth noting however, that the flash I used is an old film flash which I think is stuck on maximum output …so you can only control the intensity of the light by moving the soft box back or closer, as well as changing the ISO and aperture of your camera. The shutter speed usually has a max of 1/200 sec on most cameras that it can work on. I used ISO200 and f:16 at a shutter speed of 1/200 and it worked well I think.
I also tried a different approach, with a black + white backdrop. Further experimenting is needed, but all in all I find that it was a success.
And here is “El Donqui” which my musician friend Juan David brought back for me from Colombia.