Studio Lighting Modifiers at Arch Photo Studio
— What’s Available and How We Use Them

When you hire Arch Photo Studio, you’re using the same lighting kit that Robbie Ewing — the studio owner — uses for his own commercial and portrait work. That means the modifier collection isn’t a generic starter pack; it’s what’s actually been chosen, tested, and added to over years of real shoots. Robbie’s view is that modifiers matter more than the lights themselves — the same strobe with a snoot, a 100cm beauty dish, and a lantern softbox will give you three completely different images. This post runs through what’s available at the studio, how each modifier behaves, and how we actually use them day-to-day.

Softboxes

The studio has square, octo, strip, round parabolic, and lantern softboxes. For most portrait and product work they’re the default starting point — they diffuse the strobe into soft, even light that wraps around the subject and reduces harsh shadows. The four-softbox setup in the images above is a typical configuration for eCommerce clothing shoots where you need clean, consistent light across a full session.

Beauty Dishes

Beauty dishes sit between a softbox and a bare strobe — softer than hard light, more directional than a large softbox, with a distinctive quality that works particularly well for faces. They come in 55cm, 70cm, and 100cm. At Arch Photo Studio, Robbie’s go-to is the 100cm white beauty dish rather than the octobox for most portrait work — the round catchlights it produces are cleaner and more natural-looking than the octagon shape. The 70cm version with a grid is used when you want that same quality but tighter, with less spill onto the background.

Umbrellas

The studio uses umbrellas primarily as reflective bounce lights with front diffusers, which makes them behave similarly to a softbox but with one significant advantage — they’re much easier to work with colour gels. The tradeoff is that you can’t attach a grid, so they’re less controllable for spill. The images above show umbrella softboxes with one gelled pink, with the camera white balance set to tungsten to shift the ungelled side blue — a straightforward in-camera trick for two-colour portrait lighting without needing a second gel.

Standard Reflectors, Magnum & Long Throw

The standard 7-inch reflectors focus the strobe into a harder, more concentrated beam — useful for creating texture, shadow definition, or a more dramatic look. The studio also has a Magnum and a Long Throw reflector, both of which do the same job but spread the hard light across a wider area. The Magnum is a good key light when you want impact without going full spotlight — the Vicky Sutton images above use it as a key with a beauty dish as fill.

Barndoors

Barndoors are adjustable metal flaps that attach to standard reflectors and let you shape where the light goes — controlling spill, cutting light off a background, or creating a harder edge on the beam. They work in combination with the reflectors rather than on their own. The BTS image above shows them being used with continuous lights and LED panels for a dance video shoot.

Gobo Projectors

Gobo projectors cast shapes and patterns using interchangeable metal gobo discs — window frames, venetian blind slashes, foliage, geometric shapes, abstract cuts. At Arch Photo Studio they get used regularly, either projecting a pattern onto the background for interest, or projecting directly onto the subject’s face for more graphic, editorial work. The Megumi images above show the projector throwing a shaped slice of light across the face — the blue tone is the same tungsten white balance trick as the umbrella section.

Fresnel Spotlight, Snoots & Gobo Spotlight

These three modifiers all do a version of the same thing — concentrate the light into a tight, directional beam — but with different levels of control. A snoot is the simplest: it narrows the beam into a fixed cone, good for a hair light or accent spot. A Fresnel has a wider beam with more even intensity across it. The gobo spotlight (optical snoot) is the most precise — it has an adjustable iris for controlling beam width, can be focused, and takes gobo discs like the projector. The SPO images above show the gobo spotlight used as a hard key while a gobo creates a circle on the background wall.

Lantern Softbox

The lantern softbox disperses light in all directions from a central point, producing a soft, ambient wrap rather than directional illumination. It works well as a fill or as a base light in a multi-source setup. The images above show it combined with a scrim panel for a book light setup — the lantern fires through the scrim to produce an exceptionally soft, wide sidelight. Good for skin, editorial work, and any shot where you want the light to feel natural rather than constructed.

Diffusion Scrim Panels

Scrim panels are large diffusion frames that soften any light source fired through them, turning a harder modifier into something much more gentle. They need to be used with another light source — a bare beauty dish, a standard reflector, or a lantern work well. The Naala images above show the scrim with a standard reflector as the key; the second image has had the background replaced using AI tools in post.

Using the Arch Itself as a Modifier

The railway arch lining is white and curved, which makes it a large, natural bounce surface. Robbie uses this for all his eCommerce work for McCollin Bryan furniture — pointing strobes up and back into the arch rather than directly at the subject gives a very soft, even wrap that’s almost impossible to replicate with a standard softbox. The curve means the light comes from a wide spread of angles simultaneously, which is particularly useful for large or reflective products where you’d otherwise get hotspots.

Polyboards / Reflectors (V-Flats)

Polyboards are large white/black boards used to either bounce light back into shadows (white side) or kill reflections and deepen shadows (black side — negative fill). The studio has four, along with a large round reflector and a curved silver panel that work well for beauty and close-up portrait work. The Carlos Alesse images above show polyboards being used on the sides to control the sidelight and add negative fill — the result is a more dramatic, high-contrast look than the same setup without them.

Grids & Honeycombs

Grids attach to softboxes, beauty dishes, or reflectors and narrow the angle at which light leaves the modifier — which reduces spill onto the background and keeps the light focused on the subject. The studio has grids for the main softboxes and the 70cm beauty dish. They’re particularly useful in the blackout setup where you want to control exactly where light falls without it bouncing off the black surfaces.

What’s Included When You Hire

All of the above is included in your hire rate — there’s no separate charge for using the modifier collection. When you book, one lighting setup is included as standard, with guidance on which modifiers suit your shoot. If you want Robbie in the studio for the full session to handle lighting, that’s available as a paid add-on.

Full details on what’s included are on the Studio Equipment & Tech Specs page. For hire rates, see the pricing page.