Gary Fong vs Magmod Magsphere 2

[hjoseph7]

It's been kind of quiet in the Lighting section so i thought I'd bring this up. Does anyone have any preference between the Gary Fong Lightsphere and the MagMod Magsphere 2 ? They are both light modifiers that you place over your Speed Light to soften the light and minimize shadows. 

First of all I hate using these these things at events, because they make you look like the "The Man from Mars" , but sometimes they do come in handy in that they minimize ugly shadows, tone down hot-spots and soften the light. It's either that, or draging a softbox, or umbrella to the event which is not always possible at a crowded event such as a wedding. You can also bounce the light of the wall, or ceiling which is really my favorite method, but agan is not always possible. Sometimes you are miles away from the nearest wall, or the ceilings are too high, or they are painted with weird colors. The last thing you want to do is bounce the light of colored ceilings like the color blue, or yellow which will taint all of your pictures and is hard as hell to remove in post processing. Believe me I done so in the past !

So, in comes the handy light diffusers... At first I was really hesitant about getting the Gary Fong due to the cost. A whopping $85 for a piece of tupper-ware plastic. It was only after my job 'highly' recommended it that I picked one up Used on eBay. The Gary Fong does help in eliminating shadows, but what I do is place a regular  Sto-Fen diffuser https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/854002-REG/Sto_Fen_OM_ET_OM_ET_Omni_Bounce_for_Canon.html over my speed light then place the Gary Fong over it. This reduces shadows to almost zero. The way the Sto-Fen diffuser works, is that it scatters the light so it bounces of walls ceilings in all directions. ** So using one outdoors is a total waste of time, becuse there is nothing for the light to bounce off. The Gary Fong and the MagMod do not scatter the light in this manner, so they can also be used outdoors.

The only problem with the Gary Fong/Sto-Fen combination is that it is heavy and a little cumbersome. Even without the Sto-Fen it is still heavy. The MagMod is lighter, less cumbersome easier to connect and it does not make you look like "The Man from Mars". 

I recently purchased a MagMod kit which is even more expensive than the Gary Fong ! a whopping $105 on Amazon !. However, after viewing some pictures taken with it by a Second Photographer at a recent wedding,  I was hooked. I was really anticipating taking this thing to my next wedding and leaving the Gary Fong at home.  Unfortunately, under  some rigorous testing at home, I noticed that the Gary Fong actually won out in a head-to-head comparison(IMHO). Although both diffusers softened the light, but the light coming out of my speed light with the Gary Fong was softer and warmer.  The light coming out of the MagMod was slightly blueish and the shadows were harsher.  The differences were not Huge by any means, but they were still there. I'm guessing that some might like the look of the MagMod Magshere which to me looks more natural, but when it comes to photography sometimes 'more natural' is not always better...    

Nevertheless i have no regrets in purchasing the MagMod. It definitely fits in my bag a lot easier than the Gary Fong. It is also lighter and less cumbersome. Maybe in real-life situations it might even outperform the Gary Fong, so I'll have to keep you posted...      

 

 

    

 

   

[rodeo_joe1]

On 9/30/2023 at 6:31 PM, hjoseph7 said:

The Gary Fong and the MagMod do not scatter the light in this manner, so they can also be used outdoors.

Errrm, they exactly do work by scattering the light and bouncing it back off any surrounding surfaces. Because the area of light they present to the subject is just not large enough to be classed as a soft source.

Diffusion alone does not soften a light source. The area of a small source like a flash has to be considerably increased to have a noticeable softening effect. This is lighting 101.

Check it out for yourself, outdoors at night, comparing the spread of shadow edges (the true test of light softness) using any kind of diffusing Dutch cap over your flash versus the bare direct flash. I think you'll find the only visible difference is a loss of one or more stops of light. 

In my tests you need about a 12" square softbox type diffuser (at portrait distances) to soften the shadow edges to any useful degree. 

Edited October 10, 2023 by rodeo_joe1