Cross Polarizing

I've been wanting to do this for quite some time, just couldn't figure out an easy way to attach my 82mm polarizers to my flash units, until I ran into something at Lowes. At any rate, here are the parts. Two PVC downspout adapters, two 77to82mm stepup rings, two LED flashlights, a couple of bag dividers, and some velcro.

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Two bare flash on either side.

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Very cool DIY, I like the fact that it is pretty clean to look at. Is this mostly for macro/art reproduction?

I see the results, but what are the polarizers actually doing to cause the results and what exactly do you mean by lining them up?

Nice DIY set up. There is also the option of buying a sheet of linear polarizing film and using that with a custom mount.

Chechgio, light can travel in linear, elliptical, and circular wave forms depending on the light source and the surface. The goal here is to filter all the light so it is all a linear wave form. By using a polarizer on the flash and the camera, we can be sure that the light gets polarized the the orientation we want. What the net effect of this is, we are able to either add or remove surface glare from the subject, and in turn deepen the look of colors.

An interesting side note, if he were to turn around the CPLs on the flash, he would no longer be crosspolarizing. CPLs made as camera filters are actually a linear polarizer(half wave plate) on the front and a circular polarizer(quater wave plate) on the back. You can see this with you own CPL filter by looking at a computer monitor in one direction with it, then flipping it around and looking at the monitor in that direction.

CptTripps wrote in post #15252247
Very cool DIY, I like the fact that it is pretty clean to look at. Is this mostly for macro/art reproduction?

Definitely both, it's the only way to shoot art work such as paintings, not only do you get rid of almost, if not ALL reflections, you get the saturation that is to die for.

As far as macro goes, we'll see, it is after all a four stop reduction in your lighting capability. One might run into difficulty getting enough light shooting at f16 for instance. There is the limitation of the lack of diffusion, but at the same time most of those pesky reflections will be gone, and also at the same time, the lack of reflections could leave your picture a bit flat. One could however dial it down a bit for at least some reflection. It should be interesting and fun to find all this out on yer own.

Not sure how to pull off using two 600EX-RTs, and shooting hand held, could be a stretch. That's a lotta kit to hold steady, not to mention brackets, and the downspouts, and polarizers with flashlights.

Pi_314 wrote in post #15253516
Not sure how to pull off using two 600EX-RTs, and shooting hand held, could be a stretch. That's a lotta kit to hold steady, not to mention brackets, and the downspouts, and polarizers with flashlights.

Time to break out a piece of metal, a hammer, and the drill press I made my own macro bracket, and I think you could make yours likely the same size or smaller than mine(because i have a rather large diffuser). I added a little wood handle, which helps with keeping it steady and the weight. I still need to work on making mine lighter weight though

Interesting post, thanks for sharing.

TheLostVertex wrote in post #15253545
Time to break out a piece of metal, a hammer, and the drill press I made my own macro bracket, and I think you could make yours likely the same size or smaller than mine(because i have a rather large diffuser). I added a little wood handle, which helps with keeping it steady and the weight. I still need to work on making mine lighter weight though

Definitely looking into this, as the options available for sale are either to flimsy, way to expensive, or add to much weight to the rig.