Are you up for another DIY then. I was just about to post this, nearly the ultimate ' bug eye '.
Another rainy day here today so I decided to look at making a diffusion head for the Metz as I do not have a stofen for it.
Lots of experiments later I came up with this, and well impressed so I thought I would share it, as all the testing was done with the standard SB80-DX flashgun mounted on the camera. Performance is lots better than the stofen at the expense of 1 stop of light. The drill was used for testing as the aim was to produce more diffused shadow than the stofen. I was giving the stofen a hard time as lens to drill distance was 1 metre.
The first to fall by the wayside was the food storage container. The sides are nearly parallel so the light tends to bounce from side to side rather than exit the front. This container shape would also fall down as a ringlight.
Second. The inside needs to be crinkly kitchen roll for max diffusion. Straight shiny surface was a lot less effective. The kitchen foil used here was lightly crunched before putting into the bowl.
Note to Christine ; I have shiny tape now. It was used o join and tape down the beam splitter, and tack down the foil as it is in two pieces.
As the flash light enters directly it is necessary to deflect the beam round the bowl. For this I split the beam on the long side. To get sufficient light round the bowl the angle of the splitter has to be quite sharp. See attached diagram.
The fixing to the SB80-DX is a temporary affair and I have not yet worked out fixing for the Metz and may well go for a 12 inch bowl for that. In fact no holes have yet been cut in the container at all.
This could be the ultimate no cost device as once used can be returned to the kitchen cupboard. Otherwise the cost will be around £0:69p. I have tried it just holding it up flush to the flash and it works just as well as attatched.
IMPORTANT NOTE : If you do not cut through the bowl then be aware that a lot of heat is created by the flash tube, so either hand hold or remove between shots. If a hole is cut through the bowl then this heat can escape through the diffusion material.
Don