now if you're hoping that this is a
video where I say you need this shape
and this size of softbox for your first
softbox now I've got some real world
advice so five tips for your first soft
box what Mount does it have does it have
an inner diffuser does it have a grid
that's really important to me what's the
bag like because it'll live in its bag
longer than it'll be on the light if you
have a mobile or temporary Studio like I
do and then the most important question
the one you should absolutely ask how
quick can I put the soft box together
because if it takes me longer than that
to put it together I'm not interested
hello I'm Gavin hoey and you're watching
ader raama TV brought to you by Adorama
the camera store that's got everything
for us photographers and in this video
I'm going to give you some real advice
on how softboxes work what all of these
parts do how they affect the light
output and some ideas on how to use it
now I've got a few things to set up
whilst I'm doing that you should click
on the Subscribe button and the bell
icon so you never miss a video right
here if you're interested in the gear
I'm using you'll find that then in the
video description below okay let's get a
light set let's get a model in let's get
shooting to help me out today I've got
the amazing Chloe Chloe is going to be
the model for this photo session and
I've got a soft box to work with as well
this is a 60x 90 CM a 2tx 3T soft box
the perfect size for your first soft box
now there's an advantage to having a
rectangular softbox because you can have
it in this way or it'll rotate around
and you can have it like that you get
two soft boxes for the price of one and
yes it does affect the light output
speaking of which you might notice
there's nothing inside here at the
moment and that's because I'm going to
have a look at how this will vary
according to what you use because soft
boxes come in various parts so let's
have a look at what it looks like with
nothing inside just the bare soft box
spoiler alert it's not often I will ever
do this but we'll have a little look
okay Chloe here we go quick little test
photo and what I get is very harsh very
directional lighting but you can see
that all of the light is being thrown
forward with just a small amount of
spill out the
back this is an inner baffle or an inner
diffuser it's a small piece of
translucent fabric that attaches in this
case by velcro to the inside of the
softbox and allows the light to soften
up slightly and it does that by bouncing
light back inside of the soft box and
around off the edges and creat a much
softer look it will affect the exposure
slightly by around about half a stop 2/3
of a stop but this is what it looks like
with that in place okay Chloe here we
go and this time you can see much softer
lighting it spreads out really wide and
although it's not completely soft and
gentle it's much improved over the bare
flash on its
own this is the outer diffuser it's It's
a larger piece of translucent fabric it
fits to the outside of the softbox with
velcro and you want to get a nice neat
fit but don't put it right to the edge
leave a little bit of a gap in other
words the outer diffuser goes to the
inner edge of the
velcro and once again this will take
away a little bit of the light if you
have a flash meter you can take a flash
meter reading here we go and adjust the
power accordingly if you don't have a
flash meter you can just do trial and
error and see what results you get it's
usually about half a stop to 2/3 of a
stop difference in power okay Chloe here
we go test
photo and now we have really soft light
the spread of this is quite remarkable
you might think that a soft box just
pushes light forward but like any light
surface it'll go from all angles when it
leaves the light
source so that is where this comes in
this is an egg crate Grid or just a grid
and it attach to the velcro around the
edge which is why you wanted to put that
outer diffuser in set a little bit so
you had room to attach it its job is to
push light in a more directional manner
rather than spreading out so wide
different grids will give you different
results so it's well worth taking a test
photo once again this will take away
some light usually about a stop okay
Chloe here we go quick test
photo and as you can see you get far
more direction to the light it still has
a softness to the Shadows but it doesn't
spread up and down anywhere near as much
as it did
before so it breaks down like this the
empty softbox gives plenty of Direction
but really hard Shadows the inner
diffuser will give a wider beam of light
with softer Shadows the outer diffuser
as well will give the widest beam of
light and the softest Shadows the grid
will maintain that tighter beam of light
that we started with with the softer
Shadows that we ended with and if I turn
the soft box on its side the effect is
exactly the same except now we have less
height to the effect but an increase
although we can't see it in the width of
the
effect the height at which you place
your soft box is important and you might
think for a 3/4 length portrait like
this this is the ideal position so I've
got the top around about the same height
as Chloe's head and I've got the lower
half round about her knees exactly the
area I'm going to photograph however
it's not necessarily that easy let me
show you why okay Chloe quick little
test photo here we
go and although that looks okay have a
closer look at Khloe's face have a look
at the direction of the Shadow most of
the softbox is below Chloe's head which
means the light that's lighting her face
is mostly coming up from underneath this
is not a good lighting
position in fact what I want to do is
Elevate the soft box up so Chloe's head
is almost in the center or at least the
soft box is higher than her head that
might sound like the wrong thing to do
but it's going to give the nicest
Lighting on Chloe's face let's have have
a little look at this here we
go and that looks so much more natural
so much more realistic and is a much
better place to put your
softbox and of course you can get the
softbox and put it way above your model
so right up in the air like that is
going to give us very dramatic lighting
have a look at this okay Chloe here we
go this actually works quite well the
vertical light gives Shadows that go
straight down and that is something that
can happen with natural
daylight reviewing the vertical position
of the softbox it's perhaps no surprise
that I'll almost never put my softbox
low like this in fact it's almost always
in the center or slightly elevated like
this however if I put the softbox up
high and ask Chloe to look at the
softbox I suddenly get light in her eyes
and that makes the overhead position
really exciting for occasional use in
fact I like this so much I think we
should take a few photos like this Chloe
are you ready I'm ready okay here we
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
go in postprocessing using Photoshop or
Lightroom I gave a slight blue tone to
the images simply by taking the white
balance and moving it a little bit
towards the blue end
[Applause]
there are so many ways you can use a
softbox to get great photos and this is
just a a tip of the iceberg but we can
use the knowledge we've got here to take
some interesting photographs I've
changed Chloe out of the jacket and into
a very cheap piece of tubular stretchy
fabric which he's going to put all the
way up and well hopefully we'll create
some interesting patterns with the light
so let's take a few photos like this
Chloe are you ready ready okay let's see
what happens here we go oh
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
of course I'm definitely going to use
the Grid in this photo session and what
I did was to fit the grid and ask Chloe
to go as close to the wall as she
[Music]
could then I got the softbox and put
that as close to Chloe as I could
without it actually being in the frame
of my picture that meant that the light
wouldn't spread very far because of the
grid and because of the distance it fell
off very quickly so both the foreground
and the background are as dark as I
could possibly get
[Music]
them one thing you'll find with
softboxes is whichever one you start off
with you'll very quickly realize you
need bigger ones smaller ones rounder
ones squarer ones th ones everything is
out there and everything has a purpose
but it all comes down to experience
experiment with a single soft box and
build from there now if you've enjoyed
this video or you've got any questions
leave us a comment down below click on
the Bell icon and you'll never miss a
video right here in Adama TV
and there it is don't forget to click on
that subscribe button I'm Gavin hoey
thanks for watching