Light problems...

[danfell555]

I posted a little while back about lighting options, and now I've gone out and bought the Bowens Gemini 400s I decided on, I'm coming back for help with them... :bonk:

They're basically just not very bright. I'm just in my house, firing at a plain white wall with two lights on full power, shooting into an umbrella, about 5ft away from the wall, and the onboard flash which is in commander mode is showing up brighter than the Geminis. If I look at them while they're firing, it's pretty much blinding, so I'm a bit confused as to why it's not showing up in the picture... Any advice?

 

[Garry Edwards]

Yes. There's nothing wrong with your lights, they're just obeying orders...

The order is the pre-flash being fired by your onboard flash. The pre-flash is used to measure distance and so calculate exposure, and it's setting off your studio lights before the shutter has opened.

Use a radio trigger or sync lead instead, problem sorted

 

[danfell555]

Ah, right. Damn. I was hoping to avoid more spending. Silly D80s not accepting the sync lead...

 

[Mike Jackson]

Couldn't you just set the onboard flash in manual mode. That's how I triggered my nissins.

 

[HoppyUK]

Can't you set the pop-up flash to full manual operation on a D80? That will delete the pre-flash and the studio lights will fire in sync. You should also be able to power it down, so there is no danger of it influencing the exposure, but still bright enough to trigger the heads. Or put a couple of dark red cellophane wrappers over it, from a box of Quality Street

I think you'll find they will be quite bright

Edit: must type faster. You could also get a hot-shoe/PC adapter from Jessops for a tenner, and use the lead supplied.

 

[danfell555]

Yepp, manual mode fixed it! I'm a happy boy, thank you all