gary fong powersnoot

hi everyone, I'm a first time poster and i was searching through the forums to see if anyone had any instruction on how to use the gary fong powersnoot. A while back i bought a stroboframe camera flip and decided it wasn't really for me so i returned it and with some of the money i bought the Powersnoot.The lil card that came with it is complete crap and doesn't give me any idea on how to use it, and all gary's videos are "watch me, this is me taking a picture" and "wowwww look at that" and so forth.

Do you have to have the snoot/flash off camera to get that dramatic vignetting effect? Does it need to be on any specific settings? I've been trying to mess around with it with no luck so far. so if any one has any advice I'm all ears.

It basically is designed to turn your flash into a spot light.

http://blog.nikonians.​org …ash-snoots-and-grids.html

I just ordered this one today to use as a rim light for a studio set up.

http://cgi.ebay.com …5643dd7093#ht_3​247wt_1000

i keep trying to get that effect from it, but if i shoot with it on my 550 ex the picture either comes out over exposed due to the chrome, or it just turns out like it would if i had the bare flash. there's like zero vignetting. it's very vexing.

bcot510 wrote in post #12611098
i keep trying to get that effect from it, but if i shoot with it on my 550 ex the picture either comes out over exposed due to the chrome, or it just turns out like it would if i had the bare flash. there's like zero vignetting. it's very vexing.

If its not vignetting then either its not closed down enough, or you are using a lens that gives you a smaller field of view than the coverage of the snooted flash.

should i close down the fstop? and how can i tell about the field of view. (please forgive my lack of knowledge)

bcot510 wrote in post #12611220
should i close down the fstop? and how can i tell about the field of view. (please forgive my lack of knowledge)

Field of view is basically the angle of coverage of the lens you are using. If you have a wider lens on your camera, say the 18-55 zoomed out as wide as possible your flash might possibly vignette even without the snoot because the wide coverage of the lens is wider than that covered by the flash. Standing at the same place and using a longer lens, say a 135 for instance, the amount of area in the image is only a few square at 20 feet away so the image is still smaller than the circle of light created by the snoot. To see what I am talking about snoot your flash, aim at a wall and take shots through the range of your zoom at the widest setting then zooming in.

$45 for this thing? Fong is a marketing genius to get people to pay such crazy prices for his plastic stuff!