Photographing ball pythons

[cinderbird]

Using a flash may effect the snakes alertness during the session, making it a bit more skittish, flighty, etc Its not something big, just spooky sometimes to them. There are some positives to using light tents. You rid the image of the light reflections in the eyes from the softboxes, brolly boxes, and umbrellas. The only downside is it restricts the angles, and somewhat effects your modeling lamps accuracy compared to the strobes flash. If you're going to buy one, why not build one? Building one, you can make one to meet "your"
needs, and not settle for what they have. That and you can use the material you see fit. They're not that hard to make either, and cost around a 3rd the price Good luck with whatever you do.

I've got experience with this, if the animal is used to being handled on a regular basis, they wont react to the flash. HOWEVER, if you have animals that arent handled often and live in rack systems (from my experience) they will twitch when the flash goes off. Its not painful to them, they dont strike but they almost jump. Its just because of the sudden increase in light. You'd jump too! They get used to it after a few fires though.

They do definitely restrict your angles (the tents) BUT, they also kind of help keep the snake corralled and in an area for you to photograph without getting stuff in the background.