You can find me on instagram at instagram.com/scottchoucino/ and I have also re opened my food photography background shop at www.tinhousebackgrounds.com
Oh man, what a great video. My head just went 🤯 Now I understand why all my photos look the same style. Thanks for all these videos Scott. Greetings from Venezuela
Thank you for the quick and concise explanation. So simple yet incredibly helpful. And yes, significant percentages of houses in America are ridiculously large or huge. Such as waste of space.
I wish to address the "elephant in the room" First: Scott Choucino's advice is bang on, but does not address the "real question" Why a soft box? Pro's Its a box, and does not cast light everywhere. Shape, in this case it emulates a window Easy to set up, and often is soft (large compared to the subject) Con's Light fall off (I will come back to this) Should be close to the subject (I will come back to this) Diffuse layer creates both a colour cast (specular highlight) and changes the colour of the light. (Depending on the cloth, it is not just a colour Kelvin shift, but a CRI problem) Why is light brighter at the source? Two primary reasons, how parallel the light beams are (collimated), and the atmosphere. Atmosphere: Is really how much it makes the light less collimated. Early morning light is 3800 Kelvin, because it is scattered through more atmosphere before it reaches us, and depending how much dust there is, it will appear red. (Dust attracts water droplets, and is a sign of clouds). In a studio, probably not a big deal unless we are using steam, smoke etc. Collimation: This is a measure of how parallel the light beams are. The sun being approximately 93 million miles away, means that it is highly collimated. The clouds etc diffuse this If we have a highly collimated light source, (example laser), then there will be very little light fall off across our photography table. (say 2 metres). Herein is the problem with the softbox. It is designed to produce scattered light. What we do, by moving it further away, is make it more collimated. (IE the further away it is, the less of the scattered light beams hit the subject, or photography table). The softbox therefore is the wrong tool for the job if we want low light falloff. (We can make it work, but we lose 4 times the light, for every stop we reduce in the falloff across the table.) What we want is a collimated light, that is large. A laser is too small. What other options are there? Parabolic box or Fresnel (lens). The problem with these is they produce a round light, which may show up in specular highlights. This can be changed with the use of a frame etc. Remember: If we move the light further away, it is becoming more collimated. (harsher shadows, that are more defined and longer) Having a large collimated light up close will do the same thing, as scattered light source (softbox) further way, but with less light loss. If we frame the large collimated light, it will produce the same specular highlights. (colour shift etc aside) The other elephant in the room is light modifiers. The two main markets are portrait and product photography. While there is some overlap for us food photographers, there is nothing specifically for us. I suggest softboxes are mainly for product photography.
Alan McKinstry great explanations here Alan. I’ll be getting into the whys in a video soon in this series. The fabric colour cast issue is really tricky when you have say 3 modifiers I f different ages or brand in one shot. I often have to scrim spill kills instead of this issue translates to what we are trying to achieve.
@@TinHouseStudioUK Yeah, that is generally why I avoid diffusion material. I prefer Fresnel's as I can adjust how collimated/scattered I want the light (Parabolic will do somewhat similar), and the Fresnel are better for colour and specular highlights.
Thanks for this... so (just trying to understand this whole inverse square thing), do grids promote more even lighting as they are producing more in the way of collimated lighting?
@@-globe they do to a point. There is kind of a scale or level of collimated light which varies from modifier to modifier. Some throw the light really far before it stops, others not so far. Sometimes a day with a lightmeter and some spare time can be useful
@@TinHouseStudioUK Thanks very for this. What I love about photography is you (I) never stop learning. Do you feel the same to a degree even though you are clearly a master?
You can find me on instagram at instagram.com/scottchoucino/ and I have also re opened my food photography background shop at www.tinhousebackgrounds.com
I have no experience in lighting and you just made it a lot more simple for me. Thanks so much man!
Oh man, what a great video. My head just went 🤯 Now I understand why all my photos look the same style. Thanks for all these videos Scott. Greetings from Venezuela
That’s great. So glad it helped
Thank you for the quick and concise explanation. So simple yet incredibly helpful. And yes, significant percentages of houses in America are ridiculously large or huge. Such as waste of space.
Glad it was helpful!
What softbox do you own that is 3x2m? The largest I see are around 1.8x1.3m. Only thing I've seen 3x2m big is a scrim
I wish to address the "elephant in the room"
First: Scott Choucino's advice is bang on, but does not address the "real question"
Why a soft box?
Pro's
Its a box, and does not cast light everywhere.
Shape, in this case it emulates a window
Easy to set up, and often is soft (large compared to the subject)
Con's
Light fall off (I will come back to this)
Should be close to the subject (I will come back to this)
Diffuse layer creates both a colour cast (specular highlight) and changes the colour of the light. (Depending on the cloth, it is not just a colour Kelvin shift, but a CRI problem)
Why is light brighter at the source?
Two primary reasons, how parallel the light beams are (collimated), and the atmosphere.
Atmosphere:
Is really how much it makes the light less collimated. Early morning light is 3800 Kelvin, because it is scattered through more atmosphere before it reaches us, and depending how much dust there is, it will appear red. (Dust attracts water droplets, and is a sign of clouds). In a studio, probably not a big deal unless we are using steam, smoke etc.
Collimation:
This is a measure of how parallel the light beams are. The sun being approximately 93 million miles away, means that it is highly collimated. The clouds etc diffuse this
If we have a highly collimated light source, (example laser), then there will be very little light fall off across our photography table. (say 2 metres). Herein is the problem with the softbox. It is designed to produce scattered light. What we do, by moving it further away, is make it more collimated. (IE the further away it is, the less of the scattered light beams hit the subject, or photography table).
The softbox therefore is the wrong tool for the job if we want low light falloff. (We can make it work, but we lose 4 times the light, for every stop we reduce in the falloff across the table.)
What we want is a collimated light, that is large. A laser is too small. What other options are there?
Parabolic box or Fresnel (lens).
The problem with these is they produce a round light, which may show up in specular highlights.
This can be changed with the use of a frame etc.
Remember:
If we move the light further away, it is becoming more collimated. (harsher shadows, that are more defined and longer)
Having a large collimated light up close will do the same thing, as scattered light source (softbox) further way, but with less light loss. If we frame the large collimated light, it will produce the same specular highlights. (colour shift etc aside)
The other elephant in the room is light modifiers.
The two main markets are portrait and product photography. While there is some overlap for us food photographers, there is nothing specifically for us. I suggest softboxes are mainly for product photography.
Alan McKinstry great explanations here Alan. I’ll be getting into the whys in a video soon in this series.
The fabric colour cast issue is really tricky when you have say 3 modifiers I f different ages or brand in one shot. I often have to scrim spill kills instead of this issue translates to what we are trying to achieve.
@@TinHouseStudioUK Yeah, that is generally why I avoid diffusion material. I prefer Fresnel's as I can adjust how collimated/scattered I want the light (Parabolic will do somewhat similar), and the Fresnel are better for colour and specular highlights.
Thanks for this... so (just trying to understand this whole inverse square thing), do grids promote more even lighting as they are producing more in the way of collimated lighting?
@@-globe they do to a point. There is kind of a scale or level of collimated light which varies from modifier to modifier. Some throw the light really far before it stops, others not so far. Sometimes a day with a lightmeter and some spare time can be useful
@@TinHouseStudioUK Thanks very for this. What I love about photography is you (I) never stop learning. Do you feel the same to a degree even though you are clearly a master?
Very useful, as usual, and straight to the point. Thanks Scott!
Thanks. glad it was useful!
This is so helpful...thank you
Glad it was helpful!
Thank you for this! learned alot!
Thanks Jan
how about discussing softbox shape for highlights?
Thanks for this very easy to get explanation.
Man, good speech but we are missing some examples of what you are talking about.
Nature Whispers yeah I’ve had this mentioned in a few videos. Will be looking inti this for future edits
@@TinHouseStudioUK Thanks, keep up with the good content! Kudos
@@naturewhispersvideos Will do. Constantly learning!
For real! lol. Felt like i was getting a lecture back at college.
Thanks for the info!
More than welcome
Would have been really helpful if you could have shown some examples coz it's pretty difficult to picture all of what ur saying
Mike Brown did a great video on different types of light involving a young lady and a hosepipe...
It’ll be better to do demos to show the differences. Theories are good but not everyone can imagine the result.
Which size octasoftbox i should buy for food videography?
Just watched..no example and preference..which one actually according to your video the size of softbox I need to buy?thanks
Watch the video again then.
Appreciate the insight and knowledge, but lack of examples and visuals have me lost lol.
Any chance you could do next vlog with your hands tied behind? 😂 #gesticulation of another level 😁
Its my Spanish routes. If I try not to move my hands I start thrashing my head about haha.
New York is in America :) jk. Cool video man
Haha. I’m forever fumbling over my words