Paul C. Buff, Inc. Technical Forum

Hi there, Everyone:

Will the old WL10,000 and WL5,000 have problems if used inside of "enclosed" umbrella mount softboxes, such as the Westcott Apollo?

1) Will they overheat in an "enclosed" style softbox?

2) Will removing the modeling bulb prevent overheating

3) Is the body of the WL10,000 so big that it will end up blocking a lot of the light?

Thanks in advance.

A lot of this will depend on what size you are using. The larger, the better for these points. Yes, removing the model lamp will help keep the temps down. The size of the unit could restrict the amount of light on smaller versions, especially if bouncing off the back of the box. Though, you could have it aimed through the fabric directly. Also, if you have not bought the Apollo, you may want to take a look at our PLM system which can maybe configured as a soft box like product: http://www.paulcbuff.com/plm.php

Thank you very much, tech support.

So in general it would be fair to say that for an internal, rear-facing softbox, the bigger the better, right?

Looking at the PLM system, it seems that they would offer something similar more similar to a softlighter than to an apollo, correct?

thanks again.

The bigger the better, at least to a certain point. Big enough so that you get fairly even light across the front face, and no shadows from the light itself.

A PLM and softlighter would probably give similar results to each other, assuming similar size and internal material, and diffusers are in place on both.

The Apollo, I believe, has a lip for accepting grids. The lip would limit the spread, and the grids more so. The quality of all three, I suspect, would otherwise be similar.

Thank You!!! :D