Field Expedient Sand Bag

Every now and then a sandbag can be very helpful. Let's say you're using a speed light on a portable portable light stand. You'll find the slightest breeze may cause the whole thing to topple over. What you need is some ballast to keep you light in place.

Obviously, carry a filled sandbag is not a viable option unless you have a strong and willing entourage following you about. I don't know about you, but I tend to find myself alone when I'm in the field, so I'm pretty much on  my own. But I've found an easy way to use my camera bag as ballast by carrying a simple accessory.

I normally carry a flashlight carrying ring snapped on the strap of my camera bag. I found it in a hardware store next to the Maglight flashlights. You may (or may not) know that for many years Maglites have been employed as batons by law enforcement personnel until the PR-24 became the standard issue for most departments. Now I'm been known to carry my monopod in exactly the same manner. But these carrying ring can also be used to turn your camera bag into a handy form of ballast.

Here's a close-up of the the ring hanging on one of the tension knobs of a typical light stand. For the purpose of the photo, the bag is hung much higher on the light stand that prudent, since any weight so high on the stand doesn't provide optimal ballast. The ring is not designed to hold much weight, but if you can allow the camera bag to rest partially on the ground, you'll be fine.

You may ask yourself why I don't just use the shoulder strap. Having the flashlight carrying ring gives me the flexibility to use a variety of attachment points that one might find on the bag such as the D rings or the carrying handle itself (as seen here).

Anyway, it's an inexpensive addition to you "kit" that just might come in handy. However, when I discussed this with a friend, reminded me that an inexpensive carabiner will do exactly the same thing.

For my Chinese readers, Gung Hay Fat Choy!

If you're wondering, those are droplets of rain that you see in the photos.

Octabox On The Cheap - The Photek Softlighter

The Photek Softlighter has been described by many as the "Poor Person's Octabox". It is essentially a regular reflective umbrella that employs a translucent diffuser that covers the umbrella like saran wrap covers a bowl. In the center of the diffuser there is a sleeve that allows the head of the speed light to pass through diffuser, allowing the light to bounce off the inner surface of the umbrella and pass back through the diffuser to produce a broad, soft light source.  It's not as easy to set up as a Lastolite EZbox, but then again it costs a lot less. I like the Softlighter for its fast and easy set-up, especially if the Black Plastic Thingie is used to hold your speedlight. And like all light modifiers of  this size, it gets blown around in the wind. (Photo: Adorama.com).

By the way: If you haven't already done so, put a small Carabiner in your camera bag when you travel afield. You can use it to link a D-ring on your camera bag with one of the base supports on your light stand to make an impromptu sandbag for a little more stability in the wind.

Speed Light Position: When using an umbrella, it is always best to position the speed light as close to the umbrella shaft as possible. Unfortunately, most umbrella brackets use the speed light's hot shoe as the point of attachment, putting the light source high above the umbrella shaft. To compensate, umbrella bracket manufacturers drill the mounting hole at an angle so the line of site for the speed light intersects the shaft were it meets the umbrella. This works so long as there is vertical "space" for the speed light, as there would be in an umbrella.

The Photek Softlighter is an inexpensive lighting tool that really benefits from this on-axis speed light mounting. It is essentially a regular reflective umbrella that employs a translucent diffuser to cover the umbrella like saran wrap covers a bowl. In the center of the diffuser there is a sleeve that allows the head of the speed light to pass through diffuser so the light to bounce off the inner surface of the umbrella and pass back through the diffuser to produce a broad, soft light source.

Here is the Sunpak flash mounted on the Black Plastic Thingie and the Softlighter shaft partially inserted into the umbrella bracket. To install, you open the umbrella and thread the shaft through the diffuser's elastic sleeve. Next, secure the diffuser by passing the tips of the umbrella spines through the diffuser's grommets. To complete the installation, you position the umbrella so the flash head passes through the sleeve, then tighten in place. As you can see, the BPT brings the flash head much closer to the sleeve.

You can also see that the sleeve easily stretches around the speed light when mounted close to the axis. Also, the body of the speed light is now outside of the Softlighter, so it can be easily adjusted .

 Since proper mounting of the Photek requires a short flash to umbrella distance, the light is concentrated into a small bright spot centered on the shaft. You may want a Stofen Omni Bounce to help spread the light out to the edges of the Softlighter, giving a larger effective light source.

I was checking the web to see how other folks were handling the "flash in the hole" problem. One clever fellow added a piece of angle iron and a cold shoe to create a bracket to bring the flash much closer to the umbrella axis. While succeeds in getting the light ver close to the shaft, it puts too much weight too far from the umbrella bracket. The BPT keeps most of the weight closer to the light stand, something that seems to make more sense to me.

You can see that I installed a Calumet Wireless Trigger Kit receiver to the hot shoe. According to the description, "...This trigger set will allow you to trigger your flash over 100 meters away...". I think that's a little optimistic, but probably sufficient for the hobbyist wanting to experiment with wireless flash triggers.

For those with a Nikon DSLR or a Sony R1 with flash synchronization at any speed, this arrangements allows for easy camera connections using a modified SC-17 cable or a long PC-Male / PC-Male flash cable. Click here for some additional information.

I'll have some sample images in a future post.