I have to admit that while my eBay softbox did slightly improve the shadow edges the overall improvement was not as I had hoped. So I thought I'd fire off a shot to see just how even the light was, coming from my cheapy. Well unless there's something very wrong with my capture technique, it seems my box is actually complete rubbish. I'm sure I can mod it to improve things, but fundamentally it is nothing like a proper, double-baffled, softbox. Just look at this beautiful, soft, evenly distributed light (NOT!).
I certainly hope the Lumiquest does a better job.
I just tried a different approach, this morning, bouncing the flash off a white reflector (5-in-1 reflector/diffuser) suspended just a little way above the subject. The flash itself was on the camera and simply titled upwards towards the bounce surface. Here is the result....
Still unhappy with that result, I then tried shooting through a large diffusion panel, with the flash handheld at the end of an ETTL sync cable and the panel just a few inches above the subject. Here's the result....
Maybe the light is a little too flat, in this example, but that is easily adjusted by moving the diffuser a little further away from the subject and/or moing the flash closer to the diffuser (or narrowing its beam).
Here's the actual setup....