Diy Sunbounce with flash attachment

For those that have no clue as to what a Sun-bounce with flash attachment is, check out this website.

If you just want to see the images of the DIY Sunbounce, just scroll down.

Already a while back I’ve seen this videocast from Bert Stephani and was very impressed with the capabilities of the Sunbounce with the flash attachment. Immediately after watch the videocast I set out to get my hands on one. Big disappointment, the pricing is far from reasonable if you go for the absolute cheapest solution it will set you back $273 for a 60x90cm with a white reflector (single sided), ouch. Just to put that price a bit in perspective, a 5-in-1 (gold,silver,white,black,diffuser) fold able reflector would set you back around 35$ for a similar sized one.

That made me consider an attempt at building my own, especially as I have a 5-in-1 reflector and, better yet, also a collapsible holder for it. The nice thing is that the reflector holder has an light-stand mount on it so basically that means you have a place to start screwing things on to, and that’s what I did.

So next thing I needed was a mount to attached the flash to on one side and the reflector holder on the other. I realized that I still had one of those ancient film lamps lying around somewhere (see image) that I could ransack for parts. As a film lamp like that comes with the same universal tripod mounts as we’re used to in the photography world my job was super easy, I just had to screw everything together and Bob’s your uncle! The nice thing is that Nikon includes handy little stands with every flash they sell, what is even better is that on the underside of those stands you’ll find (you guessed it) a little hole with which you can attach it to a tripod.

Now in my case it was all very easy, I had the reflector and the holder which I bought new in a set for about $50 on offer. I did a quick search on what those parts would cost separate at the moment and it came to a total of about $70, but I’m sure if you search a bit better then I did you can get them cheaper. And even if you don’t have an old film lamp lying around, which is pretty likely, it’s still pretty easy. What you would need is about 2 screws (same thread as tripod attachment) and something to give the flash head a little distance from the reflector, I would go for aluminum which is easy to bend (if not to thick) and to drill holes in, also it’s nice and light.

So what does the original Sunbounce have what my DIY doesn’t? Well it’s faster in and out of the bag of course, but the main thing is that it can stand a lot more wind then my DIY version. The difference between the 2 is that when the wind starts to really muscle up the original will take to the air assistant and all and with the reflector completely intact, my DIY version on the other hand will probably loose its reflector and leave the assistant standing with a silly contraption and a surprised look on his or her face.

Anyway check out the images of the DIY below and if you want to see photos made with it just check out my flickr stream I’ll tag the photos “diy-sunbounce”.