Best Buy: The Essential SLR Flash Accessory

Janco Flash Diffuser for On-Board Flash

This might just be the best $12.00 I’ve ever spent.

While planning the purchase of an external flash for all of my Nikons, I came across this little gem on Amazon. It’s a knockoff of the Gary Fong “Puffer” flash diffuser, only this incarnation comes with two extra domes, one warming and one cooling.

Marketed under the Janco brand, at less than half the price of the Gary Fong version, it wasn’t even worth my while to borrow the idea and build my own. So, I ordered it; I had no expectations.

When it arrived, I was surprised to find that the manufacturing quality was much better than I had expected. Not at all “knock-off” quality. But the real joy came with the first image I captured with it.

Fleshtones gain soft shape and saturation. Gone Is the pasty, blown-out look. Colors are richer. Shadows are slightly softer. Alas, the built-in flash of my camera is now usable!

View from behind; the diffuser attaches to the hot shoe, and is adjustable for height.

Sliding into the hot shoe like an external flash, It fits on the camera as if it were made for it. I will never use my built-in flash without it!

I’m looking forward to experimenting with off-camera flash used in conjunction with this, in Nikon’s Commander mode.

The color domes will be most useful. I can white balance with them in place, and on slow sync the blue dome will warm the ambient light, and the yellow dome will cool it. Plus, the neutral dome makes a great attachment point for gel filters of other colors.
But wait, there’s more.

I plan to keep this with my camera at all times, for several reasons. The other day, while shooting my daughter’s violin concert at her school’s gym/auditorium, I discovered a quick and dirty way to tame the rather odd combination of fluorescent lighting and early evening sunlight. You guessed it! Placed over my lens, the diffuser makes an excellent incident-light white balance device. It’s dome shape allows it to fit over my 67mm filter and average the incoming light from all directions. It works perfectly, calibrating ever so slightly (less than 1%) on the warm side, which is exactly how I like it.

With all due respect, I’m sure Gary’s version is of the highest quality and yields better results. I just couldn’t pass up a bargain.