Personal Magnetism For the Speedlight Shooter - Mag Mod

Dang. Someone invented the better lighting mousetrap - and now presumably are having to resurface the pathway up to their door in anticipation of increased traffic.

Mag Mod have finally made a set of speed light modifiers that are worth using. The secret of their appeal is no secret - they have unique shapes and they attach to the speed light flash guns easily.

Note: easily. Also firmly. Firmly, as in use them in the rough and tumble of professional shooting and not have them fall off. And no more velcro bands or sticky tape panels.

The basic unit is a rubber adapter housing that stretches over the head of your speedlight. I used a Fujifilm EF-42 but I daresay the ban would go on any Canon, Nikon, Sigma, Olympus, Leica, or Nissan flashes just as easily. It's a darned sight tighter than any velcro band ever was.

On the outer edges of this band are imbedded small but powerful magnets. All the accessories that stick to the front of the adapter do so by means of their own magnets - so the things stick together fiercely. I tried to wobble the assembly apart by thrashing the speed light around in my hand and did not succeed in dislodging it one bit.

Okay, what can you stick on the front?

a. Basic 40º grid. Add another on and it becomes 20º. Add a third and it goes to 20º. Add a third...

b. A gel holder. They make sets of polycarbonate gels that last far better than the thin things on velcro. Colour correction or wild creatives in different sets.

c. A dome - looking like a soft goldfish bowl, and lighter than competing said bowls, it makes an instant bare-bulb look for diffusion. It's got a holder slot for those gels we mentioned so you don't necessarily need to stack the gel holder on too.

d. A big white rubber scoop. You swivel the flash head up and clap on the scoop. Some of the light goes out the back and fills the shot - most of the light goes out the front and illuminates the subject.

Coolest feature is the fact that Mag Mod have included two sets of magnets on the scoop - you can rotate the flash head of your speed light 90º to the right, attach the scoop looking forward, and then just swivel that head up and down as you move from landscape to portrait orientation. This looks like wedding and event shot heaven.

Here it is in operation out on the road:

e. The attachment that looks like the shift lever boot from a 1965 Pontiac or an Art Deco plumber's plunger is really an adjustable snoot. Fold the sections in and the area of illumination grows larger - pop them out and it becomes smaller. Be prepared for silly comments from the crowd.

Now there is more coming, and we'll detail it as soon as it arrives. Think Tele-Vorsatz and wide-angle panel and gobos to start with.

The strobists amongst you really owe it to yourselves to come in and see the Mag Mod.

See the Mag Mod range online on the Camera Electronic website here

Your Christmas Present Was A Speed Light - Here's The Rest Of It

If you are new to photography we want to let you into a secret - there is always more. If you thought that one purchase would equip you for a lifetime of pleasure you are either going to have thin pleasure or a short lifetime. To keep achieving, you're going to need to add more stuff.

Don't feel bad. We've all had to buy more accessories for what we use and in most cases it has actually expanded our minds and our abilities. Sometimes the extras turn out to be so simple...

For the person who has just bought or got a speed light flash for the top of their camera - hopefully from us - we say " Go out and go mad.". Take as many flash shots in all sorts of lighting conditions and of all sorts of subjects. It is the only way to find out what an electronic flash can actually do. Sometimes it does not do quite what you thought it was going to do, but with the TTL controls on most cameras it will at least do something recognisable. Keep doing this until you can be sure what will happen.

Then - think how your pictures may differ from those of the professionals in photo books and a magazines. The differences are not generally in the cameras that take the picture - they are in the light that plays round the subjects. Here is where some accessories can put you closer to that pro look.

Hahnel - famous for their chargers and flash sets - have an accessory set for all speed lights.

The various bits fit on different maker's flashes by means of an elastic band around the heads. This has one part of a velcro pad - the accessories have the other part. You can literally stick the whole thing together.

Some of the accessories spread the light - like the collapsible soft box or the diffusion card.

Some concentrate it. Just like the honeycomb grids that go on the front of studio strobes this little fellow doesn't allow any light to ride out to the side.

Do you need to jazz it up with colour? These gells fit over the front of the tube and it is all Las Vegas after that.

You also get a mounting block that can help you use your speed light on a studio stand or tripod as an umbrella holder- a surprisingly sophisticated studio technique you can use anywhere.

Best of all is the price - the whole set goes for $ 79.

Don't limit yourselves - get a set and start experimenting.

Closing The Barn Doors Before The Lightning Bolts - Elinchrom

Users of Elinchrom studio flash units please draw up a chair and sit down - this one is for you. Visitors who use other systems may sit in and pick as much out of it as they can.

I used to use as much light in a studio to take picture as I possibly could. Pushing the sliders up to the top on the Elinchrm EL 500  and 250 units was common and when they went off it looked like Alamagordo. I got up to 5 Elinchrom heads and had to start wearing a Royal Navy flash hood and gloves before pressing the trigger. Floor tiles were buckling from the heat...

This was in the days of trying to shoot time-expired X-ray film as sheet film with f stops in the 128 region. Please don't ask me why in case I figure out an answer...

Nowadays with the Fujifilm cameras and their ability to do jpegs to order, I rarely even use two of the 250 w/s. heads, and when I do I am very economical with the light. It passes through a number of mazes before it gets to the model and after that I do my best to scoop it up again and feed it back into the electricity grid.

The standard 21 cm reflector is the one that lets me employ the barn doors. Elinchrom have made the barn door holder into a dual-use device. You can put on barn doors of various types - and you can put them on all four sided of the holder if you want to - and you can utilise the holder as a way of adding honeycomb grids or gels to the light at the same time.

I reserve the honeycombs for the 18cm reflectors but have made up a varied set of gels from Lee filter material - the heat resistant variety - to add spice to the glamour girl pictures. The same sliding rails that support my home-made gel holders are the place where the Elinchrom-made honeycombs slide in.

Do the barn doors completely trap the light? No - they never do, no matter which brand you get. there always has to be a place with standard barn doors where the two elements meet and it is never light-tight. However, , when you need to shield the backdrop or other elements of the scene from the blast of the strobe it is certainly possible to flag off the light with Foam Core board or matt board attached to the metal barn doors. I have a box full of varied terry clips to do this and as long as the flag does not need to be too big it works a treat. If you need a full size board as a flag you are better off using a Manfrotto grip designed for the purpose and positioning it with a separate light stand.

And occasionally you need an assistant standing on one foot with both arms in the air and a strained look on their face to absorb the light. Disregard their language as they are under stress...