Interestng Light sources, what are your favorites?

[KevinCarter]

For Portrait, fashion lighting, what are your favorite, or most unique light products, sources you own? thanks!

[David_Buzzard]

I like natural lighting, open doors, windows, diffused sunlight. A big reflector is a handy thing to have.

Strobes are best (I think) for photos, as they're small and powerful, especially when compared to what you need to get an equal amount of light from a hot light or kino.

With digital, you don't need huge amounts of light. I've gone from using multiple 2000W power packs to just a common Nikon speedlight bounced into an umbrella. Softboxes are great, but the light has to be inside them, and that causes problems with the off camera TTL system that Nikon uses, which has to be in line of sight of the flash. Umbrellas are cheap, easy to set up and use, so that's my main source of artificial light these days.

I'm thinking of building a dual flash mount to use with larger umbrellas, or when I have over power sunlight.

David Buzzard's Technical Blog

[KevinCarter]

thanks, David:
Have you experimented with other funky things like stip lighting etc.

[DragonflyDM]

My favorite light is indirect light. If I am outdoors, I find the light (like you find) in a shaded alley, or under a scrim is the most flattering.

[Paul Kuroda]

Kevin,
Regarding your question about strips...I have a couple of Profoto medium strip lights and they are soft powerful light sources. I've used them on location a few times, but they are meant for more studio or specific uses since they are so bulky. I tried glamour doing close ups with those, but couldn't see any difference than using Molas, beauty, etc. dishes. I wouldn't invest in those again...unless you need to light an entire room without that harsh point source or umbrella quality. A regular light in a strip soft box should work for most cases.

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