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We clicked with:
Lightweight
Very useful
Like a portable studio
Can double up as a rain brolly for cameras
Shots in the dark:
Could be more rugged
Not standard brolly fitting
Hot shoes are stiff and pointing in the wrong direction
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The trouble with most flashguns is where they are positioned. Sticking a flashgun in the same plane as the lens (i.e. On camera flash) is possibly one of the worst places to position it if you want good pictures. Everything nearby is bathed in even, soulless light and the flash frequently bounces off the retina of those looking directly at the camera, resulting in that spooky red-eye effect. Getting the flash off the camera will transform your pictures (see Off-Camera flash).
Once your camera and flashgun agree to a trial separation, images improve immeasurably. However, that often means either heavy floor stands and brollies or hard direct flash, held at arm's length. The new £49.99 Velbon UC-6 is the middle way. It combines umbrella, flash bracket and clamp in one... just add flashgun for proper off-camera flash. You can clamp it to something nearby, or even hold it in your hand.
Unlike pro-grade gear, the UC-6 is made from ABS; this might not be as rugged as chunks of solid aluminium, but it also means the whole thing is exceptionally small and light - the clamp and brolly combined weigh just 440g. That means you can hand hold it without straining easily - try doing the same with a Manfrotto Superclamp, an umbrella adaptor and a photo brolly for a few hours and you'll soon discover the joys of plastic. It's also small, the two sections taking up hardly any space in your camera bag.
Because the umbrella adaptor/flash bracket part of the clamp is highly adjustable, the Velbon UC-6 has a hidden bonus - you can attach two flashes to the same bracket. This isn't recommended for heavy duty use, but if you have two flash units and want to pump a lorra, lorra light into your brolly occasionally, this is a useful bonus. One point to note, though; the hot shoes point away from the brolly - if your flash head cannot turn through 180degrees, this becomes essentially useless. The hot shoe is a very tight fit, too.
The brolly itself is a black backed white folding design. It's finished with a black plastic tip cup, like a traditional waterproof brolly handle, instead of an unfinished hexagonal centre tube more commonly found in photography. This cup sits in the flash bracket holder. This means there is no adjustment to the distance from brolly to flash at all, but it also makes it easy to put together. The Velbon UC-6 umbrella has an ace up its ferrule, too; it's water-resistant like a real commuter foldaway brolly. All of which means you can clamp the brolly to a tripod and make your digital camera shower-proof. It's too early to discuss spares (aside from a handful of terms, the box and instructions are all in Japanese), so if you lose or damage the brolly, it's unclear how much replacements will cost (if they exist at all).
Aside from its rain-dispersion properties, the Velbon UC-6 will prove immensely useful from the outset, for anyone who wants to break free of on-camera flash. As a comparison, here's three images of the same subject (my long-suffering photo-widow wife)- from left to right: on-camera bare flash fired directly at the subject; the light held pointing up and to camera left bare flash directly onto the subject; in the same position, this time with the flash reversed and pointing into the brolly. These are all straight out of the camera itself (aside from basic cropping, resizing a slight levels tweak when all three images were assembled as one) and this highlights an important advantage of the UC-6 too - speed. It took longer to type this paragraph than it did to make these portraits - set-up, shoot and strike the set all inside of 10 minutes. We'll let the quality of light speak for itself.
Although these shots are static, one of the great advantages of the Velbon UC-6 is its portability. Instead of plonking down a lighting stand and having everything move around you, holding a brolly in your hand means you can walk from place to place. Okay, a fully extended umbrella is cumbersome in its own right and you are not exactly anonymous when using it. Nevermind, you won't find a cheaper or lighter way of opening up the world of off-camera flash.
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