Inexpensive Boom Arm For Soft box

ianbarber

ianbarber

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Ian
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For the past week I have been researching soft boxes and the one that is appealing to me is the Westcott Apollo 28.

I shall mainly be using this for tabletop and still life photography so there are going to be occasions when I need to place this overhead to the subject.

Can anyone suggest an inexpensive boom are arrangement that would accommodate this type of soft box.


Ian
 
specialman said:
I have an Apollo 28" (very good) and I keep meaning to order one of these arms
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Thats pleasing to hear.

I shoot a fair bit of still life photography and I am hoping I am going to be able to use this to the side and create an artificial window light using a Nikon SB900 inside it.
 
specialman said:
Calumet does one, think it's about £50

EDIT: here it is.... http://www.calumetphoto.co.uk/eng/product/calumet_three_piece_boom_arm_with_counterweight/mf6210
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For use with a speedlight, and for your personal use, it will be perfect.

But if you were going to put a studio flash head on it, or if you were going to use it professionally, I would advise something with its own integral stand - they are designed to cope with much heavier weights and are much more stable.

I don't want to patronise you, but for safety reasons please make sure that you use the counterweight to balance it perfectly, before tightening the lock ingclamp. That way you can be fairly confident that it won't tip over. When problems occur, it's usually because the boom arm hasn't been balanced properly and the user has relied on the locking clamp.
 
domino1999 said:
I also have one of these supporting my Ultrapro300 with either a 22" beauty dish or a 60x90 softbox. Very solid setup indeed, although I very nearly dropped the counterweight on my foot from about 4ft....but thankfully it missed :thumbs:
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It's OK, the counterweight is cast iron, don't think you would have broken it with your foot:lol:
 
ianbarber said:
Well the Calument boom has just arrived. Hmm.... Does anyone know how to fix it to the light stand
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It should have come with something like this?

One side clamps 'over/around' the top section of the stand shaft and the boom goes through the other side. The multitude of holes are to accommodate differing sizes of stand/boom - good ones are marked stand/boom side and what diameter fits into which hole
 
paul williams said:
It should have come with something like this?

One side clamps 'over/around' the top section of the stand shaft and the boom goes through the other side. The multitude of holes are to accommodate differing sizes of stand/boom - good ones are marked stand/boom side and what diameter fits into which hole
Click to expand...

Managed to figure it out. It turned out that the top section of the light stand I had (Lastolite) was to thin so I had to clamp it to the next section down.

Westcot Apollo 28 arrived but it was damaged. The middle aluminium tube with the latch on it, the bit that sicks through the top of the soft box was floating around in the box.

Just deciding whether to ask for a replacement or a refund. Both the Soft box and boom arm is bigger than initially realised. I really need a bigger place to shoot this stuff :(

May have to think about trying to rent a studio with someone.
 
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