Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

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kaleun96
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Location: Stockholm, Sweden

Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

Post by kaleun96 »

I just got a 3D printer last month and have since turned my attention to printing some accessories for my flash, the popular Godox TT350. I'll share the Thingiverse link below but I'm also interested in any suggestions and ideas people might have. I have some thoughts for a more typical macro flash adapter with a much wider and curved opening that I can use with some diffusion gel and also some thoughts on an adapter that diffuses light mostly via reflection.

These adapters were designed to be used with a Profoto Dome Diffuser, which you can see is press-fit into the business end in the photos below. If you don't have one (or don't want to buy one, they're not exactly cheap), I'm sure you can adapt the STL files as necessary or just wrap some gel around the end. Each adapter twist-locks into the flange mounted to the flash head itself and there's a small detent to prevent the adapter wiggling about too much. This way if I get another flash, I can just print the adapter for the flash head and not have to re-print the rest of it.

Image
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These two things are diffuser inserts I was experimenting with that fit inside the neck of the flash adapters. The one on the left is a honeycomb-type that has angled slats, ensuring most of the light can't pass through it in a straight line. Essentially the circle is divided into four corners and each corner angles the light slightly up towards its outer-circumference (i.e. top-left, top-right, bottom-left, bottom-right). However it blocks too much light so I need to tweak the design. The second one has a similar principle except instead of a honeycomb it is circles with an increasing diameter, again forcing light to bounce off the surface and not travel directly straight. This one works much better as it doesn't block as much light but I'm honestly not yet sure how effective it is at diffusion.
20210725_190723_edit2.jpg
I'm just enjoying being able to prototype and quickly put ideas from paper into the printer so I haven't thought much about the physics behind it yet or optimising the designs for weight and strength etc. If you have some ideas let me know and I'll see if I can whip up some designs and print them.

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4916557
- Cam

Adalbert
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Re: Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

Post by Adalbert »

Hi,
Well done, I'm excited !
Best, ADi

DavyC
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Re: Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

Post by DavyC »

Cool project. I was today playing with my 2 Godox TT350 flash units. I don't have a 3D printer though. I remember a hack to the Ray Flash ring light. Fit a reflective foil to the inside of the housing. It did boost the output, or at least minimized the losses. Good luck!

rjlittlefield
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Re: Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

Post by rjlittlefield »

kaleun96 wrote:
Sun Jul 25, 2021 10:39 am
so I haven't thought much about the physics behind it yet or optimising the designs for weight and strength etc. If you have some ideas let me know and I'll see if I can whip up some designs and print them.
I have no ideas about your design per se. However, it does occur to me that you might learn valuable info about output light pattern by using your rigs to photograph a mirrored chrome ball, such as illustrated at viewtopic.php?f=8&t=43728&p=274901&hilit=ball#p274901 and viewtopic.php?p=275154#p275154 . Suitable balls can be purchased at many hardware stores.

--Rik

kaleun96
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Re: Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

Post by kaleun96 »

rjlittlefield wrote:
Sun Jul 25, 2021 12:59 pm
kaleun96 wrote:
Sun Jul 25, 2021 10:39 am
so I haven't thought much about the physics behind it yet or optimising the designs for weight and strength etc. If you have some ideas let me know and I'll see if I can whip up some designs and print them.
I have no ideas about your design per se. However, it does occur to me that you might learn valuable info about output light pattern by using your rigs to photograph a mirrored chrome ball, such as illustrated at viewtopic.php?f=8&t=43728&p=274901&hilit=ball#p274901 and viewtopic.php?p=275154#p275154 . Suitable balls can be purchased at many hardware stores.

--Rik
Rik, would you believe I was reading that exact post of yours earlier today :D

Your point there was quite apt so I will be on the hunt for some similar objects in the morning. Will be much easier to refine and discard designs with a consistent and suitable subject to test against!
- Cam

mawyatt
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Re: Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

Post by mawyatt »

Cam,

Those are really nice 3D prints!! You've certainly produced outstanding results in such a short time with your 3D printer =D>

What software did you use to design the prints?

Best,
Research is like a treasure hunt, you don't know where to look or what you'll find!
~Mike

rjlittlefield
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Re: Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

Post by rjlittlefield »

kaleun96 wrote:
Sun Jul 25, 2021 1:10 pm
Rik, would you believe I was reading that exact post of yours earlier today :D
Ah, well clearly you are tuned in to excellent sources -- or perhaps it was just a fortunate coincidence! :wink:

In either case I'm glad the post was helpful.

These 3D prints are inspiring. I look forward to more information about the software/hardware you're using.

--Rik

kaleun96
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Re: Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

Post by kaleun96 »

mawyatt wrote:
Mon Jul 26, 2021 8:25 am
Cam,
Those are really nice 3D prints!! You've certainly produced outstanding results in such a short time with your 3D printer =D>
What software did you use to design the prints?
Best,
Thanks Mike! I was really surprised how accessible this whole 3D printing stuff is and am really enjoying having one.

I've been using Fusion 360 for designing the models. You get up to 10 editable designs on a free licence but you can do quite a lot with just 10. For example, every model in shown above is in a single design and you can always make a design non-editable and then switch it back to editable later on. So it should be no problem staying at the 10 editable design limit.
These 3D prints are inspiring. I look forward to more information about the software/hardware you're using.
Cheers Rik! So in addition to Fusion 360, I use Ultimaker Cura for the "slicing" - all the tweaking of the 3D printer settings are done here. The printer itself is a Creality CR-6SE, and is relatively affordable.

I can only recommend a 3D printer to anyone here who doesn't have one. I had never used one before, never done any 3D modelling before, never even really done in-depth research of 3D printing itself, but within 30min of the printer arriving I was setup and printing a model. It's been quite easy to ramp up the learning curve at my own pace as well. You can start enabling the additional settings and tweaking them to see what effect they have before moving on to more complicated settings. I thought it would be a matter of jumping in the deep end from the start but that's far from my experience so far.

Here's what i'm printing at the moment. The idea is it will connect directly to my flash and I'll place it in front of the lens using a magic arm. The inner surface is on a 45 degree angle to direct the light upwards and the inner cylinder is cone-shaped to help reduce reflections that may make there way back down towards the lens. I'll cut some "donuts" out of diffusion gel to secure over the face and will likely 3D print some shrouds to secure the gels in-place. This is just the first iteration to see how it works in practice. I've made a bit of a mess of the 3D model files so will probably redesign from scratch and incorporate any learnings from the first prototype.
Pseudo-Axial Flash v26.jpg
- Cam

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Re: Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

Post by rjlittlefield »

kaleun96 wrote:
Mon Jul 26, 2021 11:22 am
The printer itself is a Creality CR-6SE, and is relatively affordable.
At https://creality3d.shop/collections/3d-printer/products/creality3dcr-6-se-3d-printer , I'm seeing a list price of $399 for ship from US.

Is that the right unit?

If so, then I'm having a jaw-dropping moment about how cheap & good these things have become!

--Rik

kaleun96
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Re: Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

Post by kaleun96 »

rjlittlefield wrote:
Mon Jul 26, 2021 11:58 am
kaleun96 wrote:
Mon Jul 26, 2021 11:22 am
The printer itself is a Creality CR-6SE, and is relatively affordable.
At https://creality3d.shop/collections/3d-printer/products/creality3dcr-6-se-3d-printer , I'm seeing a list price of $399 for ship from US.

Is that the right unit?
--Rik
That is the one! Some things to keep in mind about buying from the Creality printer online:
1. I believe it is www.creality3dofficial.com and not creality3d.shop, though I may be mis-remembering. One is non-official but licenced to sell their gear if I recall correctly. I was originally going to purchase from here.
2. There are usually lots of discounts available if you Google for some or use the Honey Chrome extension. I think I got the price down to about $315 on the website above after some discount hunting.
3. I heard that the Creality official website can be unreliable with delivery and may take much longer than they state. For that reason, I paid a bit more and bought from Amazon instead.

So I ended up buying one from the Sainsmart provider on Amazon, which has good reviews in the community for customer service. The one on US Amazon is unavailable at the moment. But in general it seems what you get doesn't differ depending on the distributor, as far as I can tell the packaging and equipment is all the same, it's just customer service and delivery that will differ between them.
If so, then I'm having a jaw-dropping moment about how cheap & good these things have become!
Absolutely, I thought the same! Not only the price but the fact that you can get it printing within 30 minutes and the quality was excellent from the start. Over time you may run into small problems (e.g. "zits") but with regular maintenance (cleaning the glass bed, cleaning the nozzle, controlling filament humidity etc) I've had no issues and my success rate is far better than I ever expected.
- Cam

mawyatt
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Re: Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

Post by mawyatt »

We got the Genius 3D per recommendation. Our success hasn’t been as good as yours, but acceptable. Also using Fusion, but they must think we’re making $ and causing issues trying to use the Hobby version. We haven’t made anything $ wise and not even sent a 3D object to anyone. Things printed were for lab cases for some electronics we designed for our lab use.

If we ever make any $ with Fusion then will acquire a pro license. But for now just some simple cases for our lab electronics.

Best,
Research is like a treasure hunt, you don't know where to look or what you'll find!
~Mike

MarkSturtevant
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Re: Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

Post by MarkSturtevant »

Interesting! Since you asked for ideas, I am planning to later build a pair of diffusers for my dual head flash, using a pair of these asymmetric party bowls: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07XQNW6K6?ps ... ct_details This to provide a degree of wrap-around lighting to the subject. But for a single head flash a similar design would be a single large bowl that curves around the subject on both sides.
Mark Sturtevant
Dept. of Still Waters

kaleun96
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Re: Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

Post by kaleun96 »

Interesting! Since you asked for ideas, I am planning to later build a pair of diffusers for my dual head flash, using a pair of these asymmetric party bowls: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07XQNW6K6?ps ... ct_details This to provide a degree of wrap-around lighting to the subject. But for a single head flash a similar design would be a single large bowl that curves around the subject on both sides.
Those seem like a nice wide shape and definitely 3D-printable, I might borrow some of that design for when I work on a single large diffuser that is better suited for the field! :D

So the new design I posted the other day ended up partly failing due to a support structure being knocked over while it was printing. I then changed the design to print in two parts without any major supports required and had better success. I also added a pyramid shape to the front of the inner cone that the light will first hit to help divert it around the sides of the cylinder. It seems to work OK, better than without the cone anyway (see photo comparison below).

The dovetail joint joining the two parts isn't perfect but plenty strong enough, though I will look to avoid it on my next design and find another way to join the two parts. There's also not enough light getting around the back of the cylinder either so my next approach will be to have the light from the flash divert in two paths around the cylinder and illuminate from each side.
20210728_112928e.jpg
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20210728_112751e.jpg
- Cam

kaleun96
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Re: Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

Post by kaleun96 »

Alright, here's a new design that introduces the light from the flash from two sides to get a more even distribution. The model below shows the main part, without the "lid" so to speak. I'll print this in two parts to save on having to print a lot of supports for the overhanging features that cover the top of the design.
image (2).jpg
- Cam

kaleun96
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Re: Some 3D printed accessories for the Godox TT350 flash

Post by kaleun96 »

Will keep updating here for anyone interested. The above design printed successfully and the pin-hole method for joining the two parts worked well. However, this design eats up the light and requires me to shoot at ~800 ISO, 90/s shutter, f5.6, and 1/16 setting on the flash. I could definitely do this but I'd rather fix an inefficient design than live with it.

By comparison, my first "axial" flash head design would let me shoot at 64 ISO, 200/s shutter, f5.6, and 1/128 setting on the flash. So quite a difference! I have two main theories for the reduction in illumination: loss due to thin plastic walls and constriction in the light pathways. I think I could fix both of these things but at the cost of a larger design that will take longer to print (for thicker walls and larger diameters).

For now I'm going to go back to the original design with light entering from the bottom but widen the opening from ~40mm to ~65mm to help the light spread around the cylinder. There will still be a difference in brightness at the bottom vs the top but in the grand scheme of things it may not matter. I'm also going to mount the flash head to the camera lens rather than have it lined up with the lens via MagicArms. It is possible to do but it's a pain and there's advantages to having the flash head move with the camera, such as when stacking.
20210729_140751e.jpg
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- Cam

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