As part of the light stand frenzy that’s been going on here, I thought I’d introduce you to another way of placing a flash on location in a cheap and fast way. I learned this hack from David hobby at strobist and been grateful ever since. The idea is quite simple. It is similar to the one displayed in the Spatula article (gotta love this word – spatula…), only instead of using a spatula, I am using clamps. And hey! It was from the same trip to the hardware store.
Here is the deal – the clamp handles have small holes in them. I used a drill to broaden one of the holes so it can be fitted with a 1/4 bolt. As with the spatula, you can use an umbrella holder (AKA swivel) or a standard 1/4 bolt and nut (and as I always say I love 1/4 bolts: see those great tripods / light stands: bottle cap, spider).
You can use those clamps to mount your speedlight on anything that has a flap: shelves, cabinet sides, doors really – anything. You can even use this setup to add a second flash to an existing lighting stand.
To finish the setup you can use a radio slave remote to operate your flash when you are far from your flash.
