Shooting through umbrella vs reflecting

Brandman · May 16, 2012

My question is what is the main difference between shooting a speed light through an umbrella vs shooting the light into the inside of the umbrella reflecting it?

Mike_E · May 16, 2012

Reflected is more directional.

Village Idiot · May 16, 2012

With a shoot through your can get the light source closer to the subject and a larger light source = a softer light. A reflective will be more effecient and you'll lose less light in addition to not suffering from spill that can affect the over all exposure like with a shoot through. You can also close up a reflective umbrella a bit giving you and even hard light source when you want harder edges to your shadows without going to a bare flash with reflector or bare speedlight.

Derrel · May 16, 2012

The idea that one can get a shoot through closer to the subject to make "a softer light" is a David Hobby (strobist) point of view I have heard repeated many times over. However, his little demo fails to mention that when one gets the light source really,really close to a subject, what that ALSO does is to create INCREDIBLY RAPID and INCREDIBLY STEEP FALL-OFF in light intensity, which means that objects as close as four inches off to one side of the light source can be two stops darker, and objects a foot away are four stops darker, and the lighting is not "softer" in any meaningful way, but is instead, SUPER HIGH-RATIO, and basically, looks like $h!+ on many subjects.

Interestingly, David Hobby USED TO advocate reflective umbrellas on his strobist site, but then changed his stance a couple of years in, once the strobist site got going strong.

Shoot-through umbrellas are okay for speedlight use, where the power output of the flash is actually pretty low, but to me, when used at normal shooting distances, shoot-through umbrellas produce a sickly, pallid type of lighting, which many younger shooters seem to think looks acceptable. It is hard to describe the "quality" of light that characterizes a speedlight + shoot-through....a weird, washed-out lighting effect, made from shooting a flash through cheap Chinese off-white fabric...with a hot center-spot, and very rapid light fall-off at the edges of the beam...producing excess sheen on noses and foreheads when used too close, and just looking, I dunno...cheezy. Too much specularity, and a weird transitional zone between the specular highlights and the remainder of the lighted areas. The problem is this: the shoot-through is very "HOT" in the center of the umbrella, and the peripheral part of the beam drops off VERY fast...that causes a HOT reflection on shiny or raised parts or rounded parts of the face....then the edges of the beam are this weak, diffused light...it's..just...not..that..attractive...to...many...people...BUT, the umbrellas are like $12, so...

WHen you start firing 400 to 2400 Watt-second through a shoot-through, they look EVEN WORSE, producing a mess of ambient spill light, and this awful omni-directional lighting that looks like utter crap. After shooting for 5 years with shoot-through umbrellas, I finally tried various refelecting umbrellas--QUALITY ones, and will NEVER, ever go back to shoot throughs. I don't wanna have my light look like that of a noob with a speedlight. I shotmany assignments years ago with shoot-throuyghs, before I knew what GOOD lighting looked like, and I totally regret having used them on basically, every single job I shot.

chestervn · Jul 20, 2012

Derrel said:
The idea that one can get a shoot through closer to the subject to make "a softer light" is a David Hobby (strobist) point of view I have heard repeated many times over. However, his little demo fails to mention that when one gets the light source really,really close to a subject, what that ALSO does is to create INCREDIBLY RAPID and INCREDIBLY STEEP FALL-OFF in light intensity, which means that objects as close as four inches off to one side of the light source can be two stops darker, and objects a foot away are four stops darker, and the lighting is not "softer" in any meaningful way, but is instead, SUPER HIGH-RATIO, and basically, looks like $h!+ on many subjects.

Interestingly, David Hobby USED TO advocate reflective umbrellas on his strobist site, but then changed his stance a couple of years in, once the strobist site got going strong.

Shoot-through umbrellas are okay for speedlight use, where the power output of the flash is actually pretty low, but to me, when used at normal shooting distances, shoot-through umbrellas produce a sickly, pallid type of lighting, which many younger shooters seem to think looks acceptable. It is hard to describe the "quality" of light that characterizes a speedlight + shoot-through....a weird, washed-out lighting effect, made from shooting a flash through cheap Chinese off-white fabric...with a hot center-spot, and very rapid light fall-off at the edges of the beam...producing excess sheen on noses and foreheads when used too close, and just looking, I dunno...cheezy. Too much specularity, and a weird transitional zone between the specular highlights and the remainder of the lighted areas. The problem is this: the shoot-through is very "HOT" in the center of the umbrella, and the peripheral part of the beam drops off VERY fast...that causes a HOT reflection on shiny or raised parts or rounded parts of the face....then the edges of the beam are this weak, diffused light...it's..just...not..that..attractive...to...many...people...BUT, the umbrellas are like $12, so...

WHen you start firing 400 to 2400 Watt-second through a shoot-through, they look EVEN WORSE, producing a mess of ambient spill light, and this awful omni-directional lighting that looks like utter crap. After shooting for 5 years with shoot-through umbrellas, I finally tried various refelecting umbrellas--QUALITY ones, and will NEVER, ever go back to shoot throughs. I don't wanna have my light look like that of a noob with a speedlight. I shotmany assignments years ago with shoot-throuyghs, before I knew what GOOD lighting looked like, and I totally regret having used them on basically, every single job I shot.

Thank you Darrel for such a good exerience shared.
I've experienced the same thing when using shoot-through umbrellas. the upper part of the model is well-luminated, but the lower part is in the dark.

Now, to your experience, would softbox behaves just like shoot-through umbrellas? I've tried the Gamilight softbox square 43 inch (which is roughly $50), but noticed the same thing happened? I wonder it was because of my light settup, or because the similarity between Shoot-through and Small softbox?