Do I need the $988 Elinchrom Octa Light Bank...

Wilt wrote in post #8703993
Thanks, but I don't hate you any less, because you shot her session and I didn't. And you cannot even delete the post with her shot in atonement for the distraction you have caused, because I know her website now...too late to atone! You have caused the most extreme thread drift I have ever had the privilege to see on POTN.

lol, you found her. More thread drift to come. We shot for 5 hours, indoors and outdoors, so more pics coming.

TMR Design wrote in post #8704198
I've gone to Jo-Ann Fabrics and bough standard white nylon ripstop and sport ripstop and although they do soften and diffuse the light, I don't find them to be of the same quality as the front diffusion panels on high quality modifiers. I've often heard that the fabric is all the same but I don't believe that. There are clearly differences in the fabric used.

Exactly. I'm not a huge fan of DIY modifiers but the foamcore alone is worth a try.

It's softer but I've doubled up shear curtain material for the same softness. The parachute fabric was given to me a number of years ago so that's what I use. But used the shear curtain material if I had more than one set going or if I wanted a less softer light.

Don't get hung-up on the parachute material.... any white fabric will work.

Acknowledging that the diffusion panels work just fine and/or great, depending on preferences of the user, there are definite disadvantages or differences between them and a good softbox.

1) You need much more space
2) They get a hotspot
3) The light is bound to spill on your background
4) The light bounces back at the walls and reduces contrast and adds a tint (if you have cream colored walls like I do)

Space issue:
With a softbox the light is always 1-3 feet away from the front diffusion panel. With a diffusion panel, you want the light as far as possible to make the light source larger, so add 1 or 1.5m and the whole setup grows larger.

The hotspot can't be avoided - the center is closer to the flash than sides, so while your circle of light is big, the center is much brighter than the side and thus it's effectively smaller. Elinchrom claims there's 1/3 of a stop difference between the center and edge of the octa. So you get light coming from the sides and filling in the shadows, giving smoother light.

Unless you use two extra sides to block light, you'll have to watch your background carefully. A softbox is even.

The light bounces around and is much harder to control. There's less direction to it.

This is from experiences with large diffusion panels - double ripstop nylon. You can do anything with it, but if you want to actually shoot and not mess with the equipment then softboxes are much more convenient. The light panels become a PITA to mess with.

If you want to bounce off foamcore, then the problem is the opposite - you want your flash to be in the exact same position as your model is.

I'm not saying one is better than the other, just describing what worked for me and general experience.

I'm sure they give nice light but the foamcore lightbanks seem like overkill.

The point of the foamcore to me is its simplicity and how little space it takes up. You can just lean it against a wall and bounce a light into it - it's like being able to put a window wherever you want. Once it starts getting into big constructions with diffusion material, I'd rather just use a softbox as it will be easier to position, tilt, modify, e.t.c. Of course that doesn't change the fact that the foamcore version will be 10x cheaper.

http://cgi.ebay.com …80d2&_trksid=p3​286.c0.m14

Used one on ebay. I know you aren't leaning in that direction. But that's a good deal.

final thread drift pic

man dude- great shot!!! Love the colors on her outfit. The lighting looks great!

Hermes wrote in post #8700401
No, you don't need it at all. I have two 8' x 4' foamcore boards that cost me £4 each. I bounce lights into them to give me effect of large window lighting. They are the right shape for windows and give much more natural catchlights than the Octa did. You can add fake transoms, mullions, e.t.c. to make them look exactly like windows in reflections.

If you need it to be an octabox then I'd suggest getting the 7' Photoflex Octadome for 1/3 of the price as it is a MUCH more practical softbox.

Where do you find such large foamcore in the US (besides ordering online -- what type of local store would have it?).. what is a builders depot?

curse you, I had forgotten about her! Now the vision of her will continue to haunt me once more.

My wife curses you even more (if she ever found out!)

My local camera store carries the black and white foam core, you might also find it at a display store. Foam core is extremely handy stuff, motion picture lighting trucks always have it in stock, it's very versatile.

Sometime's I've found it can give some skin a bit of a hard sheen and could often find 4x8' stuff my grip called bead board but it's not like the stuff called bead board at places like Home Depot, it was like 5/8" thick and was basically styrofoam, you had to handle it a little more gently but when he could get it, I much preferred it over foam core for faces.

Regular white foam core generally warmed up the light about 300 degrees kelvin, my local store says the stuff they have has been corrected for that. Actually though, the 300 degree kelvin warming was actually very nice on most skin.

I recently bought some all black and all white foam core at an art supply store and the largest they had was 4x5' and then they had smaller stuff as well, I got a stack of stuff for about $70 and it's nice because some of it I cut up into odd shapes for table top stuff, as I said, very handy. Some times I'll take a piece about three feet across and cut a hole in the middle just big enough to poke the lens through, for working on highly reflective products which show the camera as a reflection, you can do this with either the black or white, depending on what you want in the reflection. Still have to fix the spot where the lens is if you can't place it where it doesn't show.

Thanks

dayammm... after looking at those pics you posted i forgot what this thread was all about

Wilt wrote in post #8742348
curse you, I had forgotten about her! Now the vision of her will continue to haunt me once more.

My wife curses you even more (if she ever found out!)

LOL, Wilt. Didn't mean to cause you more distress.
I started a Britney photoshoot thread a week ago to avoid further thread drift on this thread.
https://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthre​ad.php?t=758572

Shameless update and request. Brit's black and white pic below is currently in 3rd place on Model Mayhem's pic of the day. So vote if you like it. Can't let the girl with the booty shot win 1st. Ok, maybe we can

http://www.modelmayhem​.com/potd_vote.php