On the grid…

I’ve been dipping my toes further into the strobist world of late, as you can see from my Fashion in the City shoot. Its really great fun too, combining the control of the studio with the fun and freedom of a location. In fact, I’m starting to get hooked on it, favouring working with my speedlights over my studio heads. Of course, there is a time and a place for everything.

One fascinating little gadget I picked up recently was a grid for a flash gun. Its small, compact and lightweight (isn’t everything when it comes to strobism?) and attaches to the flash using a velcro cynch strap. Quick, simple and effective.

But how effective is it?To be honest I was a little sceptical at first but I convinced myself with a quick experiment. Its very easy to do too.

1. Set up the flash, with trigger and grid attached.
2. Stand the flash about 18″ from a wall
3. From directly behind the flash, shoot the flash gun (at your synch. speed) with a lens wide enough to capture the beam of light on the wall.

For the image above I used two Canon speedlights: 580ex II with the 1/4 grid on the left and a 580ex with 1/8 grid on the right. Both were mounted on Manfrotto Nano 5001B light stands about 18″ from the wall. Triggering was by way of a pair of PocketWizard FlexTTL5 transceivers. For this test I had both heads zoomed to 105mm. I didn’t try at any other setting. It may make a difference but I don’t see the point: the grid is being used to reduce the width of the beam so spreading it by zoming out doesn’t appear to make sense to me.

I was actually really surprised by the results too. I hadn’t appreciated how effective the grids could be at controlling the light. If you don’t believe me, here is the light cast by a naked speedlight.

BTW – don’t forget that when attatching the grid to the speedlight you need to leave a gap between the grid and the flash head. I’ve melted enough gels with these little lights to know I don’t want to do the same to a grid.