buying strobist kit - advice needed

LongLensPhotography

LongLensPhotography

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Hi,

I am sorry if I am repeating the same question again.

I am going to start a pt business and will need a portable lightweight lighting kit. This means I need to go the strobist route. I have limited funds for these, maybe around £300 max, so I can't afford Pocket wizards yet. I already own Canon 430EX. For my work I could imagine using 2 to 4 units at time (main, fill, background, accent).

First of all should I get 580EX / 550 EX (around £200 on ebay) and another 430EX (£120 new @ comet)? Or shall I get 2x nikon SB-80DX / 28 ? What would make more sense?

Then what would you think about ebay triggers? Are they any good? The price is excellent though. I also thought about the cables.

Then I am going to need stands (I may also use it outdoors, so it has to be stable enough not to fall and break the flash), and softboxes or umbrellas + reflectors. What do you think about this http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&item=390043135927 and generic stands off ebay, or cheaper velbon tripods? Then there are gels, snoots (maybe cardboard will do?), and the rest...

I would be grateful for any suggestions.

Thank you
 
you could go the canon wireless flash route, and get two 430ex units or similar, and an ST-E2, or a 580ex, which will give you a 2 channel, camera controlled (I believe) wireless flash system. It's very easy, however does have the problem of line of sight being required (roughly)

However that is your entire budget, plus some.

I would strongly reccomend that you have at least one flash that you can use on camera with TTL, so at least get 1 430ex for £116 if you can find one still, it's a bargain of a price for a great flash.

If you can get two 430ex units for £116 each, I'd definitely go for this....they offer remote ttl and on camera ttl capabilities for if you upgrade to two camera bodies, or get a 580ex in the future, or even just want a backup on camera ttl flash, or find a bargain on an ST-E2 commander, all of which for about £40 over the price of a beat up old sb26 on ebay is a really great deal.

The ebay triggers with the 2* AAAs in the recievers do the job nicely, as long as you're not a pro shooter working over large distances with a 100% triggering requirement. They (mostly) have a pc socket, so rather than relying on the wobbly screw adjustment bit of the recievers to stop your flash smashing into your brolly mount, drill a small hole in the side of the recievers, and attach a small torch or similar wrist strap, and hang them, pocket wizard style. This will mean you need to buy a ~£10 hotshoe adapter and pc cable per flash, but it will also deal with the problems that the 430ex flashes have with causing interference to the radio triggers.

Stands, I have the cheap (about £11) konig branded stands, they do the job fine. If you're using them outside, especially with a brolly, find a brick or something to weigh it down.... but you could buy the most expensive small stand in the world and the laws of physics would still apply :P The benefits of the manfrotto nanos etc are a better build quality, more robust, fold up smaller, and weigh slightly less. Downside is they cost 4 times as much.

Brolly mounts, the ebay ones are ok...flash in the pan doesn't like them, but I've never had a problem with mine. www.dealextreme.com do a set for $15 including delivery for a brolly mount and an umbrella, and umbrellas on their own for about $8, all inc shipping. They're the same as the cheap ebay ones, and do the job... in honesty I wouldn't want to be using expensive umbrellas outside, because despite best efforts to weigh down stands or whatever, gusts of wind happen, and I'd rather wreck £4 brollies than £30 ones!

Snoots and grid spots, I went to a craft shop and bought some thin sheets of black and white foam. Get creative with that and some glue (use UHU or similar, not pva) and some velcro :P

gels, flashgels.co.uk are meant to be pretty awesome, and aren't too expensive.
 
POAH said:
you can get strobes a lot cheaper than that

http://www.inta-audio.com/scp/DJ_Lighting_Equipment/Strobe_Lights.html
Click to expand...

facepalm.jpg


:lol:
 
Buy two old Nikon SB26s (or similar) with optical slaves so they'll fire when the flash on your camera fires. If you're setting up a mini-studio where the lighting will remain at a constant then you don't a need TTL-based system; set the flashes to manual and then set the power, just like you would with a set of proper lights in a bigger studio. A couple of AS-19 brackets (to attach the flash to a tripod) and a couple of cheap tripods is all you need.

Okay, it's no Joe McNally set-up where you can control everything via TTL to correct exposure and meter quickly, but it's cheap, works well and because you're working o optical slaves they'll fire from a fair way away and even when line-of-sight is blocked.

Here's what I do for my magazine using an SB800 on the camera and an SB-26 ona tripod using the same method:

DSC7726.jpg


DSC7716.jpg


Hope this helps :)
 
daugirdas said:
Do I need this http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Hotshoe-Flash...14&_trkparms=72:1683|66:2|65:12|39:1|240:1318 to use 430EX as slave?

What do you think about older Metz hammerheads? They are very powerful.
Click to expand...

to use the 430ex as a slave, connected to an ebay trigger, you need one of those, yes.

Haven't looked at the old metz hammerheads... if they have variable power output though (eg 1/1 down to 1/64th power) then they sound good :)

Specialman, that would be my normal advice, but seeing as 430EXs are so cheap atm, for canon shooters at least, at least getting one, makes a vast amount of sense, if only because you can then also use it as an on camera ttl flash, which makes life SO much easier :P
 
Right I've just ordered one trigger (without anything else). I will see how good they are with my 430EX and will then decide if they are any good. It was only £15 shipped. And I guess It would make sense to get 580EX, especially if I could find a cheap ringflash adapter.

It sounds really cool that sb80dx would fire as an optical slave triggered by 430EX. Which other Nikon flashes can do that?
 
any flash with a hot shoe can be triggered from an optical slave (though not all have them built in, but you can buy a small adapter for about a fiver), however only the sb24/26/28/80dx/600/800/900 have manually adjustable output levels.

Also, bear in mind that you can't have the 430ex in TTL mode, only manual, because otherwise, the preflashes will set off the optical trigger.

If you already have a 430ex, then yeah, a 550/580ex is probably a good bet... it means you can use the 430ex offcamera using the 580ex as the commander, or use both on the ends of radio triggers, and as you said, you can get fairly cheap ringflash adapters for it.
 
You can find old Sunpak 622 hammerheads complete with ringflash.

Lastolite do a modified Manfrotto brolly bracket, designed for the Metz range.
 
Why manual? You can use the commander flash on the camera to control the power output of each flash If I remember rightly.

Taken from the 550EX manual:

In a wireless flash system, the flash mode (E-TTL autoflash, high-speed sync, manual
flash, stroboscopic flash), flash exposure compensation, flash exposure bracketing,
and other settings are all set with the master unit. The master unit transmits all these
settings to the slave units by wireless signals. Controlling slave unit(s) is the same as
controlling one on-camera Speedlite.

So by the sounds of that, you can control the power output remotely.

http://gallery.nathue.dk/tingsager/Manualer/speedlite-550-ex-eng.pdf

The Nikon CLS system is much easier (and reliable) than the Canon one but for ease of use, I actually find that setting everything manually works just as well. You just need a reference point to work from and then you can adjust power levels accordingly.
 
If this is for a business forget about using Ebay triggers or you'll end up looking like a **** in front of your customers when they repeatedly fail to fire properly.
 
Update: I received my ebay trigger, 2 reflectors and Metz 45CL-4 with SCA adapter (non-digital).

Ebay trigger worked like a charm for a few test shots, not a single missed frame yet within 1/250s (sadly doesn't work with faster shutter):
3486035034_d24b57175f.jpg


Question: the receiver doesn't have PC sync port, so how do I wire flash with the PC cable? (the trigger is too wobbly for mounting on a stand with a flash)

Now metz flash raises more questions: 1) how would I mount it on stand? 2) how do I adjust power settings manually? 3) should I get a "proper" flash instead? (430EX is still out of stock...). I know it would be a Great (i.e. monstrous) flash next-to-camera, but it looks too intimidating - pm me if you want one.
 
daugirdas said:
Update: I received my ebay trigger, 2 reflectors and Metz 45CL-4 with SCA adapter (non-digital).


Question: the receiver doesn't have PC sync port, so how do I wire flash with the PC cable? (the trigger is too wobbly for mounting on a stand with a flash)
Click to expand...

You need a hotshoe adapter with a pc port on it. That'll set you back another tenner :D

It's dead easy to de-wobble the receivers, all you need to do is modify the bracket so that it sits flush with the base of the receiver by drilling another hole for the mounting screw.
 
If you're DIY minded, I just put a 3.5mm (headphone) jack socket onto my ebay triggers, but if not, as flash said, you need a hotshoe to pc adapter.

another way to dewobble the triggers is to take off the screw for the screw base, and simply superglue it on instead.
 
itsdavedotnet said:
If you're DIY minded, I just put a 3.5mm (headphone) jack socket onto my ebay triggers, but if not, as flash said, you need a hotshoe to pc adapter.

another way to dewobble the triggers is to take off the screw for the screw base, and simply superglue it on instead.
Click to expand...


I glued mine as well as drilling new a new mounting hole. Belts and braces and all that sort of thing :naughty:
 
Flash In The Pan said:
I glued mine as well as drilling new a new mounting hole. Belts and braces and all that sort of thing :naughty:
Click to expand...

haha, fair enough. I just hang mine down on pc cords pocket wizard style...makes it look more pro, honest ;) :P some of the sellers selling the AAA reciever triggers have pc sockets on the triggers, so you don't even need to get handy with a soldering iron, just a small drillbit to make holes to hang them off.

that and it makes the flash more central to the brolly than sticking it on top of the receiver as well...
 
daugirdas said:
Question: the receiver doesn't have PC sync port, so how do I wire flash with the PC cable? (the trigger is too wobbly for mounting on a stand with a flash).
Click to expand...



Just DIY, its easy

2684201813_f7ec6309f2.jpg


2445639614_e8405e37d2.jpg


2983892087_c6cd7e3e71.jpg
 
Sticky backed velcro holds lots of things in lots of places! Provided they are not too heavy - commercial velcro works for them (a 12Ah battery for instance can be supported upside down using about 4" of commercial velcro and even shaking it won't get it to fall off....you need to lever it off!)

Reflectors are more useful than many people give them credit for. One light and a couple of reflectors just out of shot can be used to simulate 3 or 4 lights at a fraction of the cost.

NOTHING wrong with metz lights - mine been working for over 20 years, still on same tube and thyristor!
 
I do a lot of sports togging and skateboarding - so I've been using Vivitar285HV's, built like a warhorse :)
 
I've just discovered one cool "feature" of Canon system. I can trigger 550EX using Cactus V2 on camera, and 550EX would then trigger 430EX (and any others). So if you are one flash short, this trigger might save a day.

I've also realized, that while Metz lacks full manual controls, one could still use it with an umbrella (reflector, not shoot-through) - just rotate the head around! Even better I can trigger it from PC sync port while 580ex is on hotshoe doing its job. This is definitely interesting, only 4 flashes are slightly over top! V2s are yet to fail a single frame.
 
daugirdas said:
I've just discovered one cool "feature" of Canon system. I can trigger 550EX using Cactus V2 on camera, and 550EX would then trigger 430EX (and any others). So if you are one flash short, this trigger might save a day.
Click to expand...

That's assuming the V2s actually works :bang::naughty:
 
Flash In The Pan said:
That's assuming the V2s actually works :bang::naughty:
Click to expand...

I imagine the problems start when the batteries go low. This is what happened when I had PW on loan for a day.
 
Flash In The Pan said:
No, with the V2s they can happen randomly with fully charged batteries. Drove me to distraction.
Click to expand...

That is the receiver bit. The transmitter unit has some strange batteries as well, might be worth replacing those.
 
Flash In The Pan said:
No, with the V2s they can happen randomly with fully charged batteries. Drove me to distraction.
Click to expand...

Yep, happens to my cactus system as well - new batteries and random triggering occurs one day and then gone the next :thinking: ...cheap though!
 
ekimeno said:
Yep, happens to my cactus system as well - new batteries and random triggering occurs one day and then gone the next :thinking: ...cheap though!
Click to expand...

Inexpensive, but if you factor in the hassle and cost of eventually admitting defeat and buying something that actually works, they're not cheap ;)
 
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