Strobist Flash Umbrella Mod

If you are shooting with umbrellas you may have noticed one issue or maybe you didn't, but the flash doesn't line up with the umbrella center and doesn't spread evenly, completely ruining what an umbrella should do. The pictures below are a simple mod I have done to my umbrella's to solve this issue. read on.

This is before the umbrella mod, I even had a stofen diffuser on the end. You can see it doesn't fill the entire umbrella well. The bottom is in the dark cause the flash sits so high up. 

I took my umbrella down to my local welder and for about 20 bucks he did 4 of them. Pretty simple, I just cut a spare umbrella into 4 pieces each about 5 inches. and he welded that steel flat piece on. 

Be careful to make sure it still closes

Basically, All I did was stick the umbrella in normally with my flash and I measured from the umbrella to the bottom of my flash head on my smallest flash(sb-600) and I had a about 4.5 inches. So my welder cut the plate 4 inches, lifting the umbrella up almost in line with my flash head.

And in the end you get this. Look how much more it's centered with a bare flash head

Then just flip your flash wide angle diffuser out and like magic, you get a great full spread, even on this 43" umbrella.