In article <1998040423032501.SAA27446@ladder01.news.aol.com>, peg1126@aol.com says...

>I've seen things attached to flashes to diffuse or soften the light.
>What sort of things can be used to accomplish this? Some of them look like
>tissue paper.

There is a LOT of misinformation in this area, but a simple way to
think of it is the following: unless there are VERY nearby light-toned
surfaces to reflect light, the softness of the shadows produced by
a flash is affected only by the effective size of the light source,
the distance to the subject, and the distance the subject is from the
background. If the last two are unchanged, only the effective size
of the light source has any effect. This is why small reflectors and
"diffusers" sold for on-camera flashes often do little but cost flash
power. The most effective aids I have seen are a simple styrofoam
cup placed over the flash head (little "diffusion" advantage, but it
does allow placing the light slightly above the lens for vertical
photos, reduces the minimum possible shooting distance with a powerful
flash when used with fast film and wide stops, and broadens the angle
of coverage for super-wides), and "The Shell", a rather ingenious
device that accomplishes what the cup does, and also enlarges the
effective light source size somewhat (useful out to a few feet...).
BTW, other devices that I have seen, like mini-softboxes, and flat
reflectors, actually have smallish "hotspots", providing little
additional effective light size over the flash alone, and therefore
little advantage. Adding a simple diffusing material directly over
the flash also provides little advantage when trying to soften
flash light.
David Ruether
http://www.fcinet.com/ruether