DSLRUsers.com

No...i don;t mean start a sony dslr forum...

Not sure if there is such a topic but would be interested to see a sticky of this somewhere so people can share their ideas. eg: i know andrew has made a great onboard flash diffuser. be cool to get everything in one place.

here's one to start off with.

Rooz's GO-GO-GADGET flash clamp:


super large version can be found here for the sight challenged.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/10435080@N00/3757888442/

hate to steel your thunder, but this sort of clamp has been around for over 30 years. I had one to clamp to a rail on stairs in factory's to hold a Balcar head, or any sort of flash head..... at a pinch you could put a ball head on top of the clamp to hold a camera

yepp, i know that, and you know that...but there may be some out there that don't know about it or know they exist but not 100% sure how to do it. its all about helping our fellow members any way we can.

DIY Speedstrap and Gels
(a Honl product ripoff)

link here: (photo too big)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/10435080@N00/3598004670/

Rooz wrote: its all about helping our fellow members any way we can.

.... if you had read my post and understood what was said, you would have noticed that I also added, quote "at a pinch you could put a ball head on top of the clamp to hold a camera"

what was added was also helping members ...... you are not the first person to use this method to hold lights flashes cameras reflectors...... the method has been around longer than me.....

oh brother...i give up

Two great tips at the end of the day, thanks Rooz and Big Pix.

I also would like to have a look at those DIY flash accessories....I dont gel my flashes but I may start!

Thanks Rooz, These are absolute GOLD! I can't believe you have the clamp upside down on the ceiling! That's what I call sturdy for DIY!!!

I definitely agree about having all these guides in one place... I hope you have a website to keep all this together Rooz... I would hate for this to be wasted and would be keen to get as much exposure as possible...

Thanks also to Bigpix for his ballhead idea. [I need to get a ball head first.....]

Rooz,
What size bolt would one use? 3/8 inch?

This is similar to the Justin Clamp that everyone is raving about...

nice heads up there rooz - good timing for me too, I now have 3 flashes (one is cams) and trying to attach them to something is always a challenge.

The little ballhead you have there, what type is that? I would like the flexibility of a ballhead but dont really have the need to relieve myself of 100 bucks per flash! any suggestions??

I will definitely be keeping a bookmark to those pictures - a picture is worth a thousand words!

Unless someone can do it faster, I will try to provide an instruction guide and photos of a DIY striplight, illustrated (both actual strip light and effect) here:



Effective for very selective light.

its not a ballhead, its my old flash clamps. similar to these:
http://cgi.ebay.com.au/Flash-Mount-Umbr ... tsupported

i did do a slight modification to the nut that tightens the clamp onto the flash cos i couldn't tighten that little bolt well enuf with my big fingers. will post a pic later.

i do have ballheads aswell. i bought these ones a while ago...
http://cgi.ebay.com.au/ws/eBayISAPI.dll ... tsupported

they are fantastic. super easy to use, cheap as chips.

surenj, i just used whatever i had in the garage, they do look like they're about 3/8. something nice and thick would be recommended to make sure that you dont have to wind the clamp all the way in.

What size bolt would one use? 3/8 inch?

Camera gear uses two standard sizes:
1/4" Whitworth ( the one in the bottom of your camera)
3/8" Whitworth ( the fat one on your light stands)
The Yanks call them something different, but that's the original British (and Australian) terminology.
Until very recently, if you went into any hardware store in the land, and got some bolts, that's what you would end up with. These days Metric threads are beginning to take over, 6mm and 10mm respectively, but they don't work with camera gear. Just make sure you specify as above.
From the look of Rooz' bolt its 3/8"

Oh, and Rooz - I see you have been to IKEA as well for those kiddy table/chairs! Pretty sturdy stuff.

Well done Rooz. A new instruction on an old idea is always worthwhile especially for the newer converts to photography. Bernie's mention of the ballhead to hold a camera is also worthwhile, it can allow you to get a camera into some unusal spots.

I wonder whether Gary would consider creating a DIY section for the forum so that all the different parts can go on to a different topic? This would keep it all together for the future...

surenj wrote::ot: I wonder whether Gary would consider creating a DIY section for the forum so that all the different parts can go on to a different topic? This would keep it all together for the future...

And then we get the complaints that we have too many sections.

I've made the post a sticky.

for anyone that has one of these shoe mounts for strobes you may be familiar with that tiny little round pin thats used to tighten up the mount to the flash. if you have big fingers you may have had problems trying to tighten and loosen that sucker up.

step1: remove crap pin, (be careful not to lose the 2 little springs that are behind the plate)
step2: use 4mm thread bolt
step3: cut head off bolt
step4: screw a wingnut onto it

it now works 100x easier.

not DIY but i just recieved these little ballheads for flash/ brella. they are SUPERB !!!! (and CHEAP !!)
build quality is excellent, easy to use. small compact design. very well thought out...highly recommended !!

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/NEW-Flash-Umbrel ... tsupported

Rooz wrote:not DIY but i just recieved these little ballheads for flash/ brella. they are SUPERB !!!! (and CHEAP !!)
build quality is excellent, easy to use. small compact design. very well thought out...highly recommended !!

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/NEW-Flash-Umbrel ... tsupported

Looks like a very good alternative to the 'frotto brolly adaptor that costs about 3 times as much. I presume you can simply screw the plastic flash stand (thinking about the SB800) to this ball head?

Reschsmooth wrote:

Rooz wrote:not DIY but i just recieved these little ballheads for flash/ brella. they are SUPERB !!!! (and CHEAP !!)
build quality is excellent, easy to use. small compact design. very well thought out...highly recommended !!

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/NEW-Flash-Umbrel ... tsupported

Looks like a very good alternative to the 'frotto brolly adaptor that costs about 3 times as much. I presume you can simply screw the plastic flash stand (thinking about the SB800) to this ball head?

sure can pat

Poon had some of these at PMA.

They sold out very quickly; I'll ask him for pricing.

gstark wrote:
They sold out very quickly; I'll ask him for pricing.

not surprising, they are fantastic. gary i think this would be highly useful to add to the bargains list. aussie costs of even replicas of this type of head are between $40 and $60 EACH. and when i looked at them myself, they are not even close to the quality and versatility of the above little units.

i also bought a bunch of sb900 replica stands, (with a METAL thread, not the cheap ass pathetic plastic threads nikon supplied with their TOP OF THE LINE $700 sb900 ), i think i paid $25 for 4 of them shipped from china.

Rooz, do you mean to say it was a knock off of a design and it was made in ...........China

Great ideas Rooz, thanks for posting. (Ditto ATJ and dviv for your input.)

The "Rooz's DIY Go-Go-Gadget Flash Clamp" looks very handy. I am springing into
action!

Thanks for this thread
some great ideas

I would be interested in those ballheads

Tony

A project I have in mind is a olate bracket to take an Elinchrom or bowens speedring!
The function to use my existing soft box with a strobeas the remote powersource.mounted on a monopod maybee via a cheap ball head(<$20 for the ball head)
The reason for this post is to see if it exists for $30 on ebay??
It seems that this is popular but mainly buying a softbox set up for about $200--comments please
jim

Sorry I really must proof read!! A plate bracket was what i meant to say.
I have in mind a peace af 3mm ali plate wider than a speed ring so the speedring can be placed on the brkt and other accesories can be interchanged!!-cheers jim

Just a quick sketch of what I have in mind



Jim

jim i know exactly what you mean. dragonimage sell a studio adaptor for $129. its pretty good value imo. i'd love to see someone make something like that but it looks quite complex to me.

Thanks Rooz for the feed back at $129 EA it will be worth making myself as i have a machine shop
--jim

inmotion wrote:it will be worth making myself as i have a machine shop
--jim

definately ! would love to see what you come up with.

just keep in mind that the DI version comes with a ballhead, coldshoe and mount for your lighting tripod. so that's around $40 odd just there. it also comes with the a height adjustable speedring , (standard studio mount), which has got to be another $35 odd in material alone.

if you have a machine shop you;re in a good place but for those that dont have the facilities, i reckon the DI one is pretty good value.

Bunch of great ideas. Will definitely be trying out the flash clamp

Rooz wrote:

inmotion wrote:it will be worth making myself as i have a machine shop
--jim

i reckon the DI one is pretty good value.

Is this what you are talking about? I suppose it doesn't have the universal speedring however...

http://servaas.com.au/portable-photographic-flash-soft-box-diffuser-50x50cm-p-137.html

It seems to be a bargain for $80 odd delivered. This was found by Gerry who has one for his speedlight.

thats the standard sofbox similar to DI. works great, i have 2. i 60cm and one 40cm.
what i was referring to is the one with the universal speedrign though, thats the hard part for me cos its made of metal and i couldnt fabricate it.

HI Guys Its Idea time again dont know if its existing but recently shooting whales I was using 2 bodies so I thought of a Piggy back Bracket to hold 2 bodies on my monopod.My concept was an aluminium rectangle from 25x10 material that places one body directly over the other.This seemed to be the postn. that I settled on with the 2nd body to help with stability.As to the othe soft box idea I think for $70 I will just buy one.
Cheers jim

inmotion wrote: a Piggy back Bracket to hold 2 bodies

I used to have exactly such a little beastie, many years ago.

Made from 1" x 1/4" aluminium, rather than being a square, it was more of a sort of S or Z shape, with a small foot area that was screwed to the tripod mounting point on the Metz camera bracket that came with one's 45 or 60. (I think even the 402 used the same arrangement).

So, the foot was maybe about an inch long, then about 8" tall, and then a further 8" or so to run parallel to the original mounting point.

Sort of like this ...

Code: Select all

    _____
   |
   |
   |
  _



SImple, easy, effective.

Mr Darcy wrote:Camera gear uses two standard sizes:
1/4" Whitworth ( the one in the bottom of your camera)
3/8" Whitworth ( the fat one on your light stands)
The Yanks call them something different, but that's the original British (and Australian) terminology.
Until very recently, if you went into any hardware store in the land, and got some bolts, that's what you would end up with. These days Metric threads are beginning to take over, 6mm and 10mm respectively, but they don't work with camera gear. Just make sure you specify as above.
From the look of Rooz' bolt its 3/8"

1/4 and 3/8 UNC are the sizes you refer to I think - they have the same pitch and diameter as Whitworth, but a slightly different profile. Commonly available Whitworth bolts these days (gutter bolts) are very poorly made, and are probably not as close to the Whitworth spec. as the UNC ones.

Cheers

inmotion wrote:recently shooting whales I was using 2 bodies so I thought of a Piggy back Bracket to hold 2 bodies on my monopod.My concept was an aluminium rectangle from 25x10 material that places one body directly over the other.This seemed to be the postn. that I settled on with the 2nd body to help with stability.

Ok, I'm confused. Why/how would this be useful?

When you've got a camera/lens on a monopod you've usually got it lined up to be balanced comfortably and be able to look through the viewfinder while tracking your subject comfortably. I can't picture what you're trying to describe. Sure, we could somehow put two cameras/lenses on top of a monopod, but are you intending to shoot them both in stereo?

If not shooting stereo images, what combination of cameras/lenses are you thinking of as an example, and why wouldn't you just just a quick-release, switch cameras quickly, and end up with the camera still at eye-level? That's what I currently use, so maybe I'm being blinkered by my experience...

Just found this thread. I know this light tent has been done a thousand times on the internet, but here is my setup from yesterday. (I posted it on a different thread but I think here may be more appropriate). I did a product shoot yesterday (my first) and here is how I did it:



1. Make sure wife is at work so I can hijack the dining room table. (Make sure stuff is cleaned off before she comes home.)
2. Get a cardboard box and cut out 3 sides, leaving a 40mm border intact.
3. Stick on some white crepe paper ($1.25 from newsagent) with masking tape ($2.50 from Big W).
4. Add a sheet of white cardboard/paper ($1.00 from newsagent)
5. Snitch some desk lamps or whatever (halogen preferably because they don't heat up and burn house down). You could easily use speedlights or whatever but any light source should be fine. I most probably could have used stronger light but I didn't have any on hand.
5. Take a shot of white cardboard and use it for manual white balance in my Canon 40D.
5. Have fun.

The results were OK I think.




I had already packed away my camera and tripod when I took this snap with my LX3, but I shot everything in Aperture mode at F11 with tripod. Hope this helps.

Max - great results from your DYI softbox, simple setup, very effective results.

Alpha_7 wrote:Max - great results from your DYI softbox, simple setup, very effective results.

And a nice paying job to boot!

FWOAR.... nice job! =D

Colors are coming out really nicely, i wonderwhat it would be like to turn off the lights and light paint the subject in a tent. =D

photomarcs wrote:FWOAR.... nice job! =D

Colors are coming out really nicely, i wonderwhat it would be like to turn off the lights and light paint the subject in a tent. =D

This time of year it's too hot in a tent - I'm at home in the aircon.

DIY Project to improve your Photography.
Top ten DIY photography tips:

* String Tripod
* Cereal Softbox
* Homemade Reflector
* Tin Can Ringlight
* Paparazzi Helmet
* Paper Lens Hood
* Easy Light Tent
* Infinite White Backdrop
* Flash Diffuser
* Splashproofing

Best Regards

I came across this at Strobist (where else!) Most interesting light stand concept. He promises an instruction video real soon now.
(The link is to the home page not strobist)
http://blog.svarteld.com/2009/12/homegrown-ultralight-lightstands.html