Recommend shoot-through and reflective umbrella please

[Leftyplayer]

I need a shoot-through umbrella and a reflective one. I'm also willing to get a reversible one, but was unsure whether the quality is the same or if something's lost by doing it that way. There seem to be endless amounts, sizes and types and the goggling is making my head spin. Would love suggestions from some pros so that I may narrow it down faster. The cheaper the better, as long as quality is not compromised. I'm planning to use them for lighting up a room for a real estate shoot. Hopefully, I can also use them for my more common type of work, which is portraits.

Thanks in advance.

 

[joealcantar]

I rather use a reflective versus a shoot through because you can feather the light. If you use a shoot through basically the light is all over the place. But if you want the best of both worlds you can step into a Softliter II 60inch SL6000 Photek Softliter 60" Diffused Umbrella. You don't have to diffuse the light but it is there if you need to.
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Shoot well, Joe

 

[Leftyplayer]

Thanks for the suggestion, Joe. I'm thinking I'll get one of each. Though the softlighter looks nice.

 

[Derrel]

You might find a 60 inch umbrella a bit large and unweildy in many common shooting locations and situations...such as indoors in rooms that have 8 to 9 foot high ceilings...a five-foot diameter umbrella is basically a giant pain in the ass...and unless you have the**proper** flash reflector to "fill" the umbrella, the size is wasted. If you're using a speedlight,a 60 inch umbrella is too large, and you need to look into something smaller, in the 32 to 45 inch sizes. The Softlighter is a really neat type of umbrella; one you might call a double-diffusion style. The light is first diffused by reflecting off the umbrella bowl, and then that light is additionally diffused by the front fabric. I've used this exact type of umbrella in the Lastolite Umbrella Box design, which is very much like the Softlighter. The quality of the light is quite soft for an umbrella, and the enclosed design and light-proof black backing means that these do not scatter light all over the entire set or location the way some other types of umbrellas do.

Photoflex makes some decent reflective umbrellas. Speedotron has a nifty model called the Super Silver, which delivers a crisper, more-specular type of light than either a white, white satin, or soft-silvered umbrella gives. When shooting for black and white conversions, I prefer the "crisper" look of smaller umbrellas and also of silvered umbrellas. Not all umbrellas are created equally; there are some really cheap, crappy new products being produced in China, and there are some older, much more-expensive designs that use entirely different materials, and which are actually better tools. The Photek Softlighter for example, and the Lastolite Umbrella Box are both of the "older, more-costly, better" school; there are some enclosed double diffusion umbrellas being made in China, and they retail for $35 for two! (look at Steve Kaeser Enterprises or on eBay.)