Part of the reason we don't like photos taken with the built-in flash is that the light is cold (blue) and harsh. This is not very flattering when our subjects are people. One way to improve the look of flash pictures is to diffuse the light from the flash by placing a translucent material between the flash and your subject.
There are a variety of ways to do this, including placing tissue paper or a piece of white plastic grocery bag over the flash itself. A more convenient and durable accessory is a Lumiquest Soft Screen Diffuser. This has a tab that fits into the hotshoe on top of the camera and a frosted piece of plastic that fits over the flash itself. You can see a demo of how the Soft Screen attaches in this video.
Lumiquest Soft Screen folded
The Soft Screen tab slides into the hot shoe
and hooks over the camera name plate.
The Soft Screen fits in front of the flash
creating diffusion
The effect of the Soft Screen is to reduce the intensity of the flash and slightly warm up the image.
Direct flash is cool, harsh and not flattering to the subject.
Lumiquest Soft Screen softens the flash and
adds some warm yellow tones for a more pleasing result.
You can learn more tips for improving the results from the built-in flash on your camera in Better Photos with Built-in Flash on Saturday, March 16, 2019, at the Lifelong Learning Center in Missoula, Montana. Click here to register.
