Both of these beads were shot at f8, 0.5 seconds, with the flash at half power. This time, just for kicks, I set it up on the right side of the diffusion cube (on white paper), draping a double thickness of some foamy paper/fabric stuff from the leading edge to over the lens to close the gap between the camera and cube.

f8, at half power. The shutter speed doesn't matter that much, as the basement was quite dark. Zuiko 50mm macro lens, E-620 olympus body, manual focus. The bead measures roughly 1.5 inches

These delightful objects were made not by me but my friend Cindi Brunell, and are, um, silver pink or opal yellow with one of those very expensive silver bearing artisanal glasses for the scrolling.

Exactly as above, except I moved the bead a little ways back, as it's larger. The bead is roughly 2".

What I really like about flash is the camera seems to have a much greater dynamic range with flash than the super long (1/15 and up) exposures I need for photofloods.

Unless otherwise noted, text, image and objects depicted therein copyright 1996--present sylvus tarn.