Show us your setup and the final result!

JVthePT wrote in post #18218491
Wow, that looks really good Talley! Nice work on that one.
I wasn't trying to be rude BTW, i was viewing on my phone and it made that spot look just like a bruise. Looks very different on my monitor this morning and your fix is very good, something I'm not really skilled at. How did you do it?

You weren't rude... you helped me find/fix the problem. My post skills continually need improving and I did poor the first round. Second round a success so thanks!

I just did the heal brush in LR at 50% opacity and kept hitting the same areas over and over until I got it down and would move the healing areas to just outside the bright spot to tone it down. Seem to work but man I have about 50 brushes in there. Had to select mask selection to never so I can keep going over and over.

seriously thanks.... it does look good now.

A speedlite in a RB is mostly wasted.
The fresnel lens of the speedlite focuses the light from the tube forward which means its not hitting and reflecting off the RB fabric.

That means a hot spot in the middle of the diffusion fabric at the front of the RB which leads to hot spots on foreheads.

If you want to get large soft diffused light from a speedlite use a reflective modifier like a Westcott Apollo or knockoff.

dmward wrote in post #18219263
A speedlite in a RB is mostly wasted.
The fresnel lens of the speedlite focuses the light from the tube forward which means its not hitting and reflecting off the RB fabric.

That means a hot spot in the middle of the diffusion fabric at the front of the RB which leads to hot spots on foreheads.

If you want to get large soft diffused light from a speedlite use a reflective modifier like a Westcott Apollo or knockoff.

Ya I kind of got that vibe after using it this past time. I did pull the wide angle deflector out for 14mm on that but I get your point. I was just carrying my smaller bag and only took the one speedlight. I need to get in the habit of carrying the CL-360II

dmward wrote in post #18219263
A speedlite in a RB is mostly wasted.
The fresnel lens of the speedlite focuses the light from the tube forward which means its not hitting and reflecting off the RB fabric.

That means a hot spot in the middle of the diffusion fabric at the front of the RB which leads to hot spots on foreheads.

If you want to get large soft diffused light from a speedlite use a reflective modifier like a Westcott Apollo or knockoff.

Elinchrom has deflectors which work with all modifiers. It is similar to the disk in a beauty dish and comes in gold, silver, white and translucent. The Elinchrom to speedlight converter supports the system. This works pretty well with speedlights. I mostly use the Godox 360, but I tested with a typical speedlight. You might be able to get or rig something similar with your existing modifier.

The "beamy" problem is not just limited to speed lights. My Profoto heads exhibited the same effect in large mods at first. Changing the lens to the frosted dome helped a lot. The 69" Rota will still get hot spots if not feathered judiciously.

I wonder if one of those diffuser domes would help speed lights fill big mods better?

chris_holtmeier wrote in post #18219601
The "beamy" problem is not just limited to speed lights. My Profoto heads exhibited the same effect in large mods at first. Changing the lens to the frosted dome helped a lot. The 69" Rota will still get hot spots if not feathered judiciously.

I wonder if one of those diffuser domes would help speed lights fill big mods better?

Joe McNally thinks so, he uses a stofen type modifier on his speedlites when he puts them into soft boxes, at least when he's doing road shows for Lastolite, etc.

F2Bthere wrote in post #18219360
Elinchrom has deflectors which work with all modifiers. It is similar to the disk in a beauty dish and comes in gold, silver, white and translucent. The Elinchrom to speedlight converter supports the system. This works pretty well with speedlights. I mostly use the Godox 360, but I tested with a typical speedlight. You might be able to get or rig something similar with your existing modifier.

I agree that a deflector, however one gets it setup is a benefit when using a speedlite.

In my experience, the best large modifiers for speedlites are the umbrella frame modifiers like the Apollo and knockoffs. They are easy to carry and setup and the indirect light from the speedlite files them, especially when the wide angle lens is dropped into place. The S bracket from Godox does a reasonable job getting the flash tube close to the center of the modifier.
I use a Buff mini boom to get some offset so they can be tilted in a larger arch.

I really don't think that was an issue guys... I took many photos of many family members and didn't have an issue but with my sister. Please understand that I had the lights a tad hot and her makeup with the pita. I was able to correct it but the rest of the time no issues.

It even worked out good for a group photo and doing a 36" RB for a group wasn't the ideal solution but it worked.

Talley wrote in post #18219658
I really don't think that was an issue guys... I took many photos of many family members and didn't have an issue but with my sister. Please understand that I had the lights a tad hot and her makeup with the pita. I was able to correct it but the rest of the time no issues.

It even worked out good for a group photo and doing a 36" RB for a group wasn't the ideal solution but it worked.

The reason for the comments isn't to critique your technique or shots; its to point out that its nearly impossible to light the entire surface diffusion panel on a softbox with a centered flash tube that has a reflector projecting its light forward.

There is always a cone of light with the greatest intensity at the center and fall off toward the edges. An effective cone is generally considered to have 1 EV or less light from the center to the edge.

The purpose of a softbox is to find a way to get the light intensity as near even as possible across the surface of the front diffusion panel. That best way to do that, in my experience is with indirect light from the source toward a deflection plate or aimed toward the back of the modifier which encourages the light to bounce around inside the modifier and then exit via the front diffusion material as a large, even diffused light source.

Doing that has many benefits, one of which is diminishing the problem with hot spots on skin even if its somewhat shiny.

dmward wrote in post #18220078
The reason for the comments isn't to critique your technique or shots; its to point out that its nearly impossible to light the entire surface diffusion panel on a softbox with a centered flash tube that has a reflector projecting its light forward.

There is always a cone of light with the greatest intensity at the center and fall off toward the edges. An effective cone is generally considered to have 1 EV or less light from the center to the edge.

The purpose of a softbox is to find a way to get the light intensity as near even as possible across the surface of the front diffusion panel. That best way to do that, in my experience is with indirect light from the source toward a deflection plate or aimed toward the back of the modifier which encourages the light to bounce around inside the modifier and then exit via the front diffusion material as a large, even diffused light source.

Doing that has many benefits, one of which is diminishing the problem with hot spots on skin even if its somewhat shiny.

Thanks for the explanation. My only concern is when using the CL-360 it's does indeed fire everywhere inside the softbox however you still get direct flash. Why is there not some easily to mount deflector for the 360 that would assist in this or is it less of an issue when using the barebulb design?

Talley wrote in post #18220100
Thanks for the explanation. My only concern is when using the CL-360 it's does indeed fire everywhere inside the softbox however you still get direct flash. Why is there not some easily to mount deflector for the 360 that would assist in this or is it less of an issue when using the barebulb design?

Just to be sure, you were using the 360 bare bulb inside the softbox, right? and not with the 7" standard reflector on?

I have tried to Jerry-rig deflectors on several occasions.

I have decided that learning to feather mods is a better use of my time.

SYS wrote in post #18220206
Just to be sure, you were using the 360 bare bulb inside the softbox, right? and not with the 7" standard reflector on?

lol I'm not that newb. But my point is shouldn't all strobes basically have a beauty dish type deflector

Talley wrote in post #18220286
lol I'm not that newb. But my point is shouldn't all strobes basically have a beauty dish type deflector

The bare bulb sends light in a way that fills the modifier. This is what most modifiers are designed for. You can think of it as behaving somewhat like a bare lightbulb.

Speedlights are tiny and have to be designed to take maximum advantage of the (relatively) minimal amount of light their combination of tube and capacitors is capable of generating. The way this design works is that there is a focused reflector designed to send as much light forward. In front of the tube and reflector is a fresnel type lens which is designed to focus the light forward. This is, in effect, more like a spot light or a flashlight.

So, if you imagine you have hung up a sheet between you and your subject and you pull out a focused flashlight and shine it at the sheet, you will have a fairly small circle on the sheet and you can imagine the light will be brighter in the center. Now try the same with your lightbulb and the sheet will be more evenly illuminated. Now imagine if you aim your flashlight at an angle so the circle becomes a bigger shape.

Feathering the perfectly filled light modifier at the subject will generally give you a more flattering light. If the modifier is less perfectly filled, feathering helps even more.

Makeup with oil will exacerbate the problem with a specular highlight.

This image is a straight out of the camera JPEG (with added compression thanks to Instagram )

https://www.instagram.​com/p/BNhsujUhuHV/

It uses a somewhat parabolic 16" reflector (Elinchrom Maxi Lite, aka "fireball") with a gold deflector in place. The strobe is a Nissin i40, a basic speedlight.