If you look at many of my recent Go Go Gadget articles you might notice that there is a general theme of photography. I have become a slave to the camera and like all hobbies I get involved in I find myself spending hours glued to the interwebs looking at accessories. Bags, lenses, filters, tripods, flashes, softboxes, bokeh kits. There are just so many things, and I want all of them!
Now the problem is that photography is an expensive ass hobby (why do I pick the spendy ones everytime?) and as my pops always said “You get what you pay for.” So I don’t see the point in buying the cheap stuff, but there are ways to modify things so that you don’t have to go out and spend lots of money.
The standard Canon flash you see most pro photographers using rangers from $250-$500 (320 ex- 530 ex) which is a whole lot of beer money. The built in flash works just fine for me most of the time. I usually use my 50mm lens when I’m shooting and that works great in low light. The big problem with the built in is that it makes things look shitty and flat, but that is easily fixed with the Gary Fong Puffer (looks like a Puffer fish kind of).
I was wandering around the camera store (awful idea) and noticed the Puffer and thought “Hmm $15 ain’t bad, why not?” I purchased the Puffer and figured this would be a great way to use my built in flash to take softer pictures and $15 is a reasonable price. Its basically just 2 pieces of plastic that come apart so its easy to throw it in with your camera and its pretty sturdy so I don’t worry about it bouncing around in my bag.
The diffuser slides into the hot shoe mount on top of your camera and since its plastic it shouldn’t be read by your camera. My T2i noticed it and refused to deploy the built in flash so I just slid it back a tiny bit and every thing worked fine. There are guide holes so that you can center the Puffer on your flash for the best light diffusion and basically that is all there is to it. Start shooting. It is perfect for taking close ups of stuff you are putting on Ebay or Etsy as well as portraits. If you aren’t ready to drop the coin on a serious flash but want to kill the harsh light from your built in, grab it. Its 100% worth it.
