Ikea Melodi plastic light modifiers

Chris S. · Post by **Chris S.** » Wed Oct 16, 2019 1:21 am

Edit to add: Please be clear that I have not personally tried this product yet, though I intend to. I reported it here based on the described post in another forum, and it looks inexpensive, potentially useful to many of us, and is recommended by a photographer who seems to know what he's doing. But until members of our community test this product, I recommend we behave cautiously, based on the experiences of Pau, as reported below.

If you're like me, you are constantly on the lookout for inexpensive, everyday products that increase your options for diffusion of light in the photography of small things. Most of my favorite diffusers are "found items, repurposed." And for the photography of small things, control of light diffusion is a critical factor that aboslutely must be mastered. One or two attractive possibilities follow.

Retailer Ikea has on offer two plastic diffusers for pendant lights that may be of interest to the macro photography community as diffusers for macro flash--particularly for macrophotographers who work in the wild. The diffusion globes on these lights are made of polystyrene, which is easy to cut and smooth with simple tools available to do-it-yourselfers.

One is called a "Melodi pendent lamp," is 11 inches long, and sells for $10 USD. A larger model is the Melodi 15-inch pendant lamp for $20 USD. To my eye, both of these products seem potentially useful.

Giving credit where it is due, my awareness of these products came from a post on Petapixel.com entitled Photo Hack: Use an IKEA Lampshade to Photograph Reflective Products.This post includes a 17-minuted video. Expert photomacrographers may not learn much from this video, other than becoming aware of the existence of these diffusers. But beginning and intermediate photomacrographers may well learn a great deal from the well-conducted teaching in this video.

--Chris S.

Macro_Cosmos · Post by **Macro_Cosmos** » Wed Oct 16, 2019 2:58 am

Yeah these are very decent! In perspective, the Foba Cone is... $550+
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/ ... _Cone.html

Doesn't give a $530 advantage.

Another nice way is plastic containers plus sand paper, takes some time to sand down but well worth it...

kaleun96 · Post by **kaleun96** » Wed Oct 16, 2019 3:48 am

Nice! And only $5 over here in Sweden: https://www.ikea.com/se/sv/p/melodi-tak ... -60386527/

Though a shame they don't have a smaller one, I think it's a bit too big for my purposes and hard to justify the space it takes up when not in use.

mawyatt · Post by **mawyatt** » Wed Oct 16, 2019 5:35 am

Chris,

Thanks for spotting this, nice video also.

For a smaller dome diffuser the Godox Witstro AD-S17 might be useful, although you will need to cut a hole in the dome to shoot thru.

Best,

Pau · Post by **Pau** » Wed Oct 16, 2019 5:48 am

I have this lamp at the kitchen and it seems to alter too much the colour

Chris S. · Post by **Chris S.** » Thu Oct 17, 2019 1:02 am

Thanks for the comments, each of you who posted.

Pau, I'm dismayed to hear that in your experience with this product, you find it alters light color. Drat! This could be a deal breaker--thanks for reporting on it.

When I wrote my post, my intent was to share an item of interest I saw in a long video on another forum. But re-reading my post, I fear it may have falsely appeared that I had personal experience with this product, and was vouching for it. I've just now edited my post to make it clearer that I have no personal experience as yet, and meant only to pass on something I'd read, thought would interest our community, and then studied a bit online.

I intend to order one of these diffusers and test it for myself. Perhaps the current model will not change light color as Pau's model does, or perhaps such a change in light temperature can be effectively corrected in post. Or perhaps the diffuser, in opposition to the opinion of the fellow who made the teaching video, is simply unusable.

Thanks, Pau! I appreciate constructive correction, and my words (was tired when I wrote them) may have given a wrong impression that I'd tested this diffuser myself.

Best,

--Chris S.

Pau · Post by **Pau** » Thu Oct 17, 2019 5:00 am

No problem, in fact I haven't done any photographic tests, it's just my visual impression. I have a blueish white fluorescent lamp inside and the light that goes through the plastic is much more yellowish.
I first observed it when I bought the lamp about two years ago, now I think that the effect has increased (it is illuminated by direct sunlight almost every morning...)

Macro_Cosmos · Post by **Macro_Cosmos** » Fri Oct 18, 2019 11:15 pm

I think it's worth mentioning that with the saturated 3D printing market being available to us, a very capable 3D printer can be had used on places like Gumtree/Craigslist for less than $500. There's transparent filaments. It's worth trying to 3D print a diffuser dome and then sanding it down with sand paper or a Dremel(R) tool. I'm actually going to design magnetic add-ons for my Godox V1 and 3D print them.

Miljenko · Post by **Miljenko** » Sun Oct 20, 2019 11:39 am

You really amaze me, guys waisting time on speculating does this lamp shade alter the light and how much. I went to Ikea an hour ago, had some Swedish meat balls, bought Melodi lamp for $5 (and Mrs. spending much more on very necessary stuff), came home and measured the difference.
Here it is. It lowered color temperature by 500K, from 5750K to 5250K. Pure white paper lightened with Godox flash and it's own difuser, then with Melodi lamp shade added. Raw shots WB measured with Photoshop ACR plug-in. The picture says it all.
The good news is that the tint didn't change so the color temperature change is pretty linear and the light seems pretty useful IMHO.

chris_ma · Post by **chris_ma** » Sun Oct 20, 2019 3:44 pm

Miljenko wrote:You really amaze me, guys waisting time on speculating does this lamp shade alter the light and how much.

I agree that a practical test is usually more useful then a lot of theory, but simply picking white balance will not tell you too much about the quality of the light diffusers (or light sources).

It could well be that a diffuser doesn't change WB at all, but at the same time blue color get more turquoise and yellows more muted or other strange shifts.
It could also be that on one camera it it doesn't change and on another you'll see a shift. pretty much the same way that two LED lights can have the same color temperature and different CRI.
You'd have to photograph a reference target to get a good idea how well colors are kept.

That said, from what I know polystyrene is pretty uniform in its absorption spectrum, so I wouldn't expect very unpleasant surprises. The gaps in white LEDs will probably a much bigger factor for those who don't use flashes.

chris

Miljenko · Post by **Miljenko** » Sun Oct 20, 2019 11:53 pm

chris_ma wrote: You'd have to photograph a reference target to get a good idea how well colors are kept.
chris

I did shot ColorChecker24 test target, of course. This is why I wrote the wb shift is linear as no particular dips or drops were noticed. So I believe I'll use Melodi lamp shade when shooting small objects other than insects I usually do. Based on this quick and dirty test, I wouldn't exactly call it "highly recommended" but "usable and useful" as more appropriate adjectives.
Best,
Mike

mawyatt · Post by **mawyatt** » Mon Oct 21, 2019 11:28 am

chris_ma wrote: That said, from what I know polystyrene is pretty uniform in its absorption spectrum, so I wouldn't expect very unpleasant surprises. The gaps in white LEDs will probably a much bigger factor for those who don't use flashes.

chris

Chris,

That explains why the white styrofoam cups work so well as diffusers, think the styrofoam is just polystyrene foam.

Best,