DIY Beauty Dish (Light Diffusing Bowl)

Yesterday I finished a Do It Yourself Beauty Dish that I found plans for on David Tejada's blog.

Equipment list:

• 1 large plastic bowl (14" or so)
  
• 1 old 50 pack CD spindle
  
• 1 convex Auto mirror
  
• 1 CD
  
• 1 Gutter connection (I first bought a 2x3" plastic piece that fit my Canon Speedlite 430ex perfectly, but I wanted to use my Canon Speedlite 580exII and the flash is too big to fit in the 2x3", so I found a larger aluminum version that works well. See Picture)
  
• 1 pack 4-40x1/2 nuts and scews
  
• 2 Krylon Fusion spray paint (For plastics), one white, one black
  
• 1 Velcro strap (I used weather stripping instead of velcro)
  

Possible Tools:

• Utility Knife
  
• Glue (spray or something like Gorilla Glue)
  
• measure utensil
  
• Power drill and bits
  
• Screw driver
  

Here is my finished product.

The backside of the bowl with the gutter connection coming from the inside.



The inside of the bowl with the CD case and the flash installed. The Plastic CD Case Cover has three sections (roughly 3.5" x 2.5") cut out of it to allow more light through (the plastic is somewhat reflecting and would limit the amount of light emitted).


This is looking down into the convex mirror and CD glued to the inside of the CD Case.

The mirror and CD are what make the dish work.


Top view

What the light looks like when the flash is fired and when it is not.



Here are some examples that I shot of myself that show with the bowl and direct flash.
Direct Flash
With Beauty Dish


Direct Flash
With Beauty Dish




Here are some additional examples with the Beauty Dish