Best controlable soft key light

berlinfool

berlinfool

Well-known member
Hey guys,

what's the best controlable soft key light solution in your opinion?

In my last shoot I used a photoflex frame with translucent fabric in front of a lowel omni light.
The result was not what I wanted: The light was just everywhere.

Is there anything I can use with the omni?
 
A little more information, please. What are you lighting?

Walter Graff shoots all his interviews with an Omni bounced off an opaque white surfaced flexfill next to the subject as the key. Using the instrument's barndoors and good positioning of the light and reflector, he manages to keep from spilling onto the background so he can light it separately as he wishes.

I use a large softbox with eggcrate but don't get any better result.

An Omni through a silk could make a nice large bright soft source but, sure, you have to flag off a lot if you don't want light everywhere. But shaping that kind of light is no different than if you were dealing with a large natural source like a window, right?
 
I want to light actors in a night/indoor scene in a room. I want to create a darker atmosphere with several small pools of light here and there.
Contrast ratio on the actors face should be about 1:3.

I watched Walter Graff's DVD and what he does is great for interview lighting but the bounce boards are too big for my situation.

The light motivation in my case would be a smaller lamp, which I would support by my soft light source.

Maybe a small fresnel with some gaze?
 
what about grids on the softboxes that would greatly control the spill while keeping the light soft. I use grids on everything, SB, Strips, Octobanks.
 
chimera work, as do some silver photoflex, most do not come with a grid you need it seperately, but they are very worth it. I use grips on everything, i am a control freak and never want any spill.
 
Check the smaller Rifalights from Lowel.
Kinoflo like fixtures usually take up less space than a softbox and come with barndoors and grids for extra controll, you might want to look into some of these as well.
 
You have to understand that by definition, what you're asking for is difficult. Soft light is uncontrolled and bounces everywhere, that's exactly what makes it soft!

Controlling soft light is not easy. Yes you can add eggcrate, but that cuts down on the softness. You can use barn doors but they're of minimal effectiveness because, again, the light is soft -- it's not tightly focused like a hard light. Hard light is controllable, soft light isn't.

You can use a smaller fixture, but then you're getting harder light again. The larger your source, the softer the light; the smaller your source, the harder the light.

Perhaps the best way to control soft light spill is to use a weaker soft light. Soft light has lousy "throw", it disippates quickly. So if you can use a very large, very weak source and put it really close to your subject, you'll have luxurious soft light that won't have any "oomph" to go spilling over onto your backgrounds and such.
 
Yeah as stated softlight imitates for example a cloudy day, the photons bounce everywhere and everything looks evenly lit.
 
Andrew Brinkhaus said:
Well said Barry. I am a big fan of Kino Flo's for compact, controllable soft light, especially in tight situations.
Click to expand...

Did a blue screen shoot couple of weeks back, used 3 Kino Flathead 80's. Everytime I use them I am never dissappointed by the eveness they deliver (from my rental company at least).

Cant wait to try Richards units out though.
 
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