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Bridging Tech and Creative Photography
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Cheat Sheet Education

Photography Cheat Sheet: How to Use a Softbox for Portrait Photography

Chris Gampat
No Comments
04/23/2020
3 Mins read
How-to-Use-a-Softbox-by-The-Phoblographer

We know lots of you would love a photography cheat sheet on how to use a softbox.

The softbox is arguably the most popular light modifier for photographers. It’s also a tool that lets you direct lighting to exactly where you want it with the most control. Softboxes come in a variety of sizes and shapes. They’re useful for photography at any time of the day or night, but they’re most often used in studios. However, we’d recommend that you take it out on location and shoot with one by blending the natural light with the softbox’s output. And to help you, we’re releasing an original infographic that’s going to teach you about how to use a softbox.

“Softboxes take the fundamental values of light and find a way to shape and mold them. To understand this a bit better, think about how fairy lights, a desk lamp, and ceiling lights all affect a room differently. They’re all different shapes and sizes, and are placed in different ways.”

– How to Use a Softbox: A Visual Guide for the Photographer New to Lighting
One softbox camera right, non-freeze action mode, I.E normal shooting mode, ISO 100, 1/160th at f5.6 with the light set to +0.7

Softboxes are defined by a few things:

  • The color of the interior. Silver adds punch to the light while white softens it. Use white to flatter someone’s skin
  • How big they are. The bigger they are in relation to your subject, the softer the light will be
  • Position: Want to flatter someone? Make the light come from above

In addition to all this, softboxes are tools that give photographers what’s called directional lighting. When light is directional, that means that it’s coming from a specific source and being very focused or controlled. It’s the difference between a bare light bulb on your ceiling (not directional) and a bulb with a lampshade on it (directional, since it narrows and focuses the beam of light). In this way, softboxes let photographers have the most control over the lighting in their photos. This is one of the reasons why they’re so popular unless you wish to get experimental. Unlike a lampshade though, softboxes work in a different way to soften the light. They also work to make it as even as possible without a hot spot being in the middle.

Flash or strobe at the back end (or sometimes from the bottom)

Flash fires into the softbox

Light bounces around and gets diffused by an interior diffuser

The light goes through the interior diffuser and bounces around more

Light hits exterior diffuser

Lighting Basics: How to Shoot Portraits with a Softbox

Got a small softbox? Then maybe you shouldn’t try to light an entire person with it. If your softbox is around 14 inches, then it’s large enough to photograph really just a person’s face while delivering soft light. If you’re looking for a hard light look, then you can use it to shoot the entire person. If your softbox is seven feet wide, then we’re sure that it’s going to be delivering and spreading the light across enough space to give off a soft look.

“…place the light camera right or camera left (everyone has a better side). Slightly angle the person towards the light source while also posing them accordingly. What this mostly does is make the light look natural and like window lighting. “

Three Tips for Beginners on Using a Softbox for Photography

Our photography cheat sheets are powered by Visme.

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Chris Gampat

Chris Gampat is the Editor in Chief, Founder, and Publisher of the Phoblographer. He provides oversight to all of the daily tasks, including editorial, administrative, and advertising work. Chris's editorial work includes not only editing and scheduling articles but also writing them himself. He's the author of various product guides, educational pieces, product reviews, and interviews with photographers. He's fascinated by how photographers create, considering the fact that he's legally blind./ HIGHLIGHTS: Chris used to work in Men's lifestyle and tech. He's a veteran technology writer, editor, and reviewer with more than 15 years experience. He's also a Photographer that has had his share of bylines and viral projects like "Secret Order of the Slice." PAST BYLINES: Gear Patrol, PC Mag, Geek.com, Digital Photo Pro, Resource Magazine, Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Finance, IGN, PDN, and others. EXPERIENCE: Chris Gampat began working in tech and art journalism both in 2008. He started at PCMag, Magnum Photos, and Geek.com. He founded the Phoblographer in 2009 after working at places like PDN and Photography Bay. He left his day job as the Social Media Content Developer at B&H Photo in the early 2010s. Since then, he's evolved as a publisher using AI ethically, coming up with ethical ways to bring in affiliate income, and preaching the word of diversity in the photo industry. His background and work has spread to non-profits like American Photographic Arts where he's done work to get photographers various benefits. His skills are in SEO, app development, content planning, ethics management, photography, Wordpress, and other things. EDUCATION: Chris graduated Magna Cum Laude from Adelphi University with a degree in Communications in Journalism in 2009. Since then, he's learned and adapted to various things in the fields of social media, SEO, app development, e-commerce development, HTML, etc. FAVORITE SUBJECT TO PHOTOGRAPH: Chris enjoys creating conceptual work that makes people stare at his photos. But he doesn't get to do much of this because of the high demand of photography content. / BEST PHOTOGRAPHY TIP: Don't do it in post-production when you can do it in-camera.
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