Ron Kramer said you can use a window and a cookie pan (as a reflector). There is also putting up a sheet between the subject and the light and there is shooting outside under diffuse light (shade, cloudy day, etc.)
Certainly a "cooler" way would be to use electronic flash equipment rather than hot incandescent lighting, not to mention that the latter either requires filters or tungsten-balanced film. Well, if you’re shooting film; otherwise use of the white balance on digital cameras may take care of color shifts. The drawback to flash is the lack of any modeling lights, but even there you should be able to rig up some sort of mount to bounce a smaller incandescent or flood lamp out of the umbrella and use that to get some idea of the lighting.
As a photo hobbyist, I didn’t want to spent too much money on studio lighting equipment when I wasn’t even sure how much it would be used. So, the approach I took was to go ahead and buy some relatively inexpensive umbrellas, mounts, and light stands, and then use them with my two Minolta flash units. Doing it over, I’d not have bought two flash units, as they were pricey at $250 or so each and one usually meets my other needs. Instead, for the $250 saved, I might’ve found a good price on used Novatrons or similar equipment.
Regardless, I followed an article I’d come across for building a "poor man’s modeling light" for electronic flash. It basically involved stitching across a loop of 1-inch wide elastic so as to form a figure eight of sort…a small loop and a larger one. The large loop went around the flash body which was mounted in a shoe on the light stand, and the small loop when around a standard, switched incandescent light socket. A small 25-watt flood light served as the modeling lamp. Since the lamp does get rather hot, a support of bakeable Fimo (??) clay was built up around the stitched part of the elastic loop. After being baked in a low-temp oven, the clay became a rigid support that offset the lamp away from the flash body enough that heat could dissipate and not damage the flash.
Other approaches would probably work as well and perhaps even be easier, but this seemed a reasonable idea at the time…10 years ago or so I think?
In any case, the idea is that at least flash units provide greater light output than lamps do.
Regards,
Daryl
….and don’t ask about my effort to make a low-cost but portable background stand. 😉
Are you shooting inanimate subjects or things that move like people?
If it’s the former, you can continue to use the hot lights and simply bounce them off white surfaces such as sheets, walls, cardboard, etc. The diffusion you get will correspond to the size of the surface vs. the actual subject, not the intensity of the light itself. For example, if you want to diffusely light a human being, the light source will have to be at least as big as the person.
If you’re trying to freeze moving subjects, you’ll have to move on to electronic flash off-camera. Here, the reflectors and diffusers will be the same but the expense will come with the flash units, flash meter, and various connecting cables or slaves.
There are other easy ways of creating a diffuse light such as axial lighting. Tell us what you’re trying to do.
Chuck
