My DIY ringlight

SloYerRoll

I really took my time making this and think it is well constructed. I gave it a drop test off my balcony (no strobe attached:D) and it didn't even wince!

I took two rubbermaid containers of the same height and fused then together so it's essentially one piece. Lined the inside w/ commercial tin foil and mounted it w/ spray adhesive. I also set the "inside" ring to project out about 1/2 inch further than the "face" of the flash to help cut down on lens flare. 1/8" lexan face w/ white paper mounted to the face of it w/ spray glue.

Seven coats of Krylon black later. I really like it and only have a few things I'm going to change (more cosmetic than anything).

Sorry for the crappy shots of the righlight. I didn't much care how they turned out.





My daughter Ky who normally HATES having her picture taken. (sorry for the b/g, I didn't hesitate since she rarely smiles with glass pointed at her)


Me

Nikolai

Shweeeeet
Awesome DIY, man! I'm gonna try it one day!

SloYerRoll

Thanks Nik!
I'm gonna try this out w/ my macro setup to see how it works. It will either look great or really boring.. Find out soon enough!

Travis

Thats the best looking DIY ringlight I've seen and it obviously produces some nice light judging by the test shots. I did a diffusion panel/stand project this past weekend which I'll try to post this weekend.

One question... how did you fuse the containers? I'd love to see a schematic. Thanks for the post!

Eric&Susan

Travis wrote:

One question... how did you fuse the containers? I'd love to see a schematic. Thanks for the post!

SloYerRoll

Travis wrote:

Thats the best looking DIY ringlight I've seen and it obviously produces some nice light judging by the test shots. I did a diffusion panel/stand project this past weekend which I'll try to post this weekend.

One question... how did you fuse the containers? I'd love to see a schematic. Thanks for the post!

Thanks for the compliment Trav!

I fused the containers together with a little chemical magic. Eventually I'll spec it out so I can share. The hardest part was actually cutting out the lexan so it would fit properly w/o too much gap. I ended up using a dremel and high speed carbon grinder tip.
I hope you understand I'd rather spec the whole thing out and release it than just toss out stuff here and there. I promise I'll do it now that there's a remote interest! I will say that a dremel or high speed cutting tool is almost essential unless you want to do an excruciating amount of work.

If you have the tools and parts. You could probably do this in an afternoon minus the paint job.

Serrator

Very nice work on your DIY ringflash! Will be looking forward to your instructions.

SloYerRoll

Thanks Serrator.

I'll be sure to post a link to them in this thread when I'm done documenting. I'm busy doing a few other projects I promised to do first though, so it'll take a little while.

I'll make sure to have a downloadable PDF for you DIY types that would like to tackle this too!

Skippy

SloYerRoll wrote:

I really took my time making this and think it is well constructed. I gave it a drop test off my balcony (no strobe attached:D) and it didn't even wince!

I took two rubbermaid containers of the same height and fused then together so it's essentially one piece. Lined the inside w/ commercial tin foil and mounted it w/ spray adhesive. I also set the "inside" ring to project out about 1/2 inch further than the "face" of the flash to help cut down on lens flare. 1/8" lexan face w/ white paper mounted to the face of it w/ spray glue.

Seven coats of Krylon black later. I really like it and only have a few things I'm going to change (more cosmetic than anything).

Sorry for the crappy shots of the righlight. I didn't much care how they turned out.

My daughter Ky who normally HATES having her picture taken. (sorry for the b/g, I didn't hesitate since she rarely smiles with glass pointed at her)

Me

Hey this is way cool :ivar

SloYerRoll this is brilliant, love the shape.
A masterpiece of the hands even I love you people I do I do

This just thrills me to bits when I see people share their skills,
not matter how small or how big they are, and it is done so freely.

Excellent Post SloYerRoll, I have booked marked it myself
... Skippy
.

Travis

SloYerRoll wrote:

Thanks for the compliment Trav!

I fused the containers together with a little chemical magic. Eventually I'll spec it out so I can share. The hardest part was actually cutting out the lexan so it would fit properly w/o too much gap. I ended up using a dremel and high speed carbon grinder tip.
I hope you understand I'd rather spec the whole thing out and release it than just toss out stuff here and there. I promise I'll do it now that there's a remote interest! I will say that a dremel or high speed cutting tool is almost essential unless you want to do an excruciating amount of work.

If you have the tools and parts. You could probably do this in an afternoon minus the paint job.

Understand completely and looking forward to tutorial!

SloYerRoll

Thanks for the kind words guys n gals!

ian408

That is cool. Looking forward to the instructions.

Nikolai

Jon,
while you're at it you may consider putting your "howto" on this site: http://www.instructables.com/, since it's kinda tuned up for this kind of things (i.e. publishing DIY instructions)
HTH

DonRicklin

Travis wrote:

Understand completely and looking forward to tutorial!

The Ring first seen by me here Build a ring light for less than a night out
at Make Magazine!

Looks like you did a good job of it Jon.

Don

Nikolai

LRmvcDonR wrote:

The Ring first seen by me here Build a ring light for less than a night out
at Make Magazine!

Looks like you did a good job of it Jon.

Don

Don, that's a good one, too, thanks for the linkie!

jeffreaux2

The ringlight is pretty cool. One of the best looking DIY ringlights I have seen. I can't wait to see the full breakdown on it.

On the other hand, that shot of your daughter is just over the top cute!!!....and sheesh does she look just like her dad or what?



.....btw it looks as if the tooth fairy has been working OT under her pillow!!!

What a little heartbreaker!!

SloYerRoll

LRmvcDonR wrote:

The Ring first seen by me here Build a ring light for less than a night out
at Make Magazine!

Looks like you did a good job of it Jon.

Hey Don, thanks for the compliment. I hadn't seen this link before, but I plan on my next one looking pro level like that!

jeffreaux2 wrote:

The ringlight is pretty cool. ....
.....btw it looks as if the tooth fairy has been working OT under her pillow!!!

What a little heartbreaker!!

Thanks for the compliments Jeff! She hasn't even started loosing teeth yet. She's only 2yo! I have no idea how you can say she looks cute when she looks like me Fortunatly beauty transcends genetics..

There have been quite a few PM's in here and other places asking for details on this. So I'm going to remake the entire ringlight taking detailed notes and shots to boot. So the documentation will be nice and easy.


@Travis and anyone else that wants to know how I fused the plastics together. Please shoot me an email or comment in my blog after I've created the writeup. I'm going to make a DIY friendlier version using epoxies since the stuff I used can be pretty nasty and I don't want anyone getting more than glue on their jeans w/ mine

All the best,
-Jon

schmoo

Jon,

I know you've got lots on your plate, but a tute lite for Dgrin would be awesome as well.

Thanks for sharing your ingenuity!

SloYerRoll

schmoo wrote:

Jon,

I know you've got lots on your plate, but a tute lite for Dgrin would be awesome as well.

Thanks for sharing your ingenuity!

It's on the list schmoo:D

DonRicklin

More DIY Ringlights!
Now at Make Magazine: Disposable camera ring light.

Don

SloYerRoll

Thanks for that link Don!

I'm definately trying this out. Now I just need to figure how many Ws one of those flashes are. But that's no biggie. The light would be so much more even..

I guess I'd need to know the lifespan as well, I sealed my unit since if my speedlight blows I just replace it w/ a new one..

DonRicklin

SloYerRoll wrote:

Thanks for that link Don!

I'm definately trying this out. Now I just need to figure how many Ws one of those flashes are. But that's no biggie. The light would be so much more even..

I guess I'd need to know the lifespan as well, I sealed my unit since if my speedlight blows I just replace it w/ a new one..

On me!

I just love passing stuff on like this. I do it in other contexts, too, As in my Museum Exhibit work, which is where I found out about Make Magazine. Lots of fun Geeky stuff that is occassionally Camera/Photography oriented.



Don

nightowlcat

Jon, just curious, I'd been looking forward to an updated tutorial on this as well

SloYerRoll

Heya NOC.

Actually. I jsut sold the last of my SB-24's and have upgraded all my strobes to SB-800's so I'll need to make one of these very soon.

Thank you for reminding me to document it. I remembered I would, but it's always is nice to get a reminder