I'm going to photograph a corporate event in a couple of weeks and i've been to the venue before. It has very low lighting and a high ceiling and so i doubt i will be able to bounce light. I was wondering whether any of you guys could recommend an accessory that'll soften the light a bit. I'll be using a 5Dmark2, 24-70 and 580ex2. Cheers.
Your best bet is to rent a couple monolights and place them on high stands in the corners, if you really want some nice subject and background lighting. Then keep your 580 on camera and set FEC to -.5 or -1 and you'll be set.
Big sources make softer light, so there is nothing that really helps and also fits on the flash while its on camera.
Monos on a stand with China light domes or bounced into walls, or just creating a back/side main are the best hope as Ballonur points out.
to soften light you must move the source closer and or bigger to the subject. For the 580ex2 your best bet would be to use the ezybox from Westcott. They have several sizes. Joe McNally had been using one for a while and likes it. Check his website out and look for his gear bag to set which model. I have a couple of eBay 16" softboxes about the same as the ezybox once I added PhotoFlex's coldshoe bracket attached. I would get the Photoflex small Octobox myself and plan to when the time is right. I also, heard another good piece of advice here lately if you get one modifier for a light you better get two because eventually you will need it.
Thanks for the help guys. You've given me a few decisions to make. I'm going to play around with different combos for the shoot and see what gives me the best results.
The easiest way is to use two flashes with the off camera flash overlapping fill from the second mounted on a bracket.
Soft and hard are optical / perceptual illusions based mostly on how lighter or dark the shadows are. With one big source you need to move the key light so it dwarfs the head and wraps the light around it. The key light does double duty as fill.
With two lights working independently the even fill is the cake and the key light the icing on top of it. The icing (i.e. the highlights) are always the same: white. You make the cake (the shadows) dark or light by varying the fill power. The same perceptual softness can be achieved with smaller modifiers and It works even with direct flash, especially outdoors where the sky provides a huge amount of fill.
I used direct flash for 30 years before ever trying a diffuser. Fill only = flat light. Add a bit of key light over and expose for the key light highlights it and the result is a very low lighting ratio with light soft looking shadows. The shadow borders are more distinct that if a big diffuser is used on the key light, but if the key light is well placed relative to the face, particularly the nose shadow, that isn't really noticed with the ratio is kept in the normal perceptual range (what is typically seen by eye in natural / indoor lighting.
For solo studio shots I typically use a 24" x 32" SB with a 20" circle mask as key light on dark backgrounds. The mask produces round catchlights (which I prefer) and a vignetting effect over the body. For fill I usually use a 22" disk with a sock over the camera. That's not a typically use for a beauty dish but I find it works well for that task.
Here's a comparison of the two. Friends stopped by after sightseeing in nearby WashDC. I grabbed the camera with the 580ex flashes to shoot the boy, then decided to set up the lights for the other kids and a group shot...
