Lighting Equiptment Reccomendation

subtleRIPPLE · Feb 13, 2007

Hello there,

I am hoping for help in buying my first lighting kit. I saw a lecture at the nyc photo expo on location lighting and the lights used were SB800s. They sounded pretty great - but I'm not sure if it's the best use of my resources.

As fine artist who just woke up to commercial possibilities, I'm hoping to be earning some income from doing either product, portraiture or on-loaction environmental portraiture,(or other) well, as soon as I can. Is there such a thing as a kit that would work for both studio and on location?

I have a D80 and an older "on camera" Vivitar flash and feel very limited at the moment. The D80 does not have sinc cord outlet so, I image all off camera lighting is done by wireless??? Is the SB800 a good investment for the long term and, good for on location as well as product/studio/ lighting?

I currently do not even own a single lighting stand - so, wise photography gurus, for a start up set up, what should I get for say, ideally $1500 max. (will spend more if long term investment - 5 years applies)

THANK YOU!!!!

Big Mike · Feb 13, 2007

You can go the route of studio lights or the more portable 'hot-shoe' units. The studio lights are more powerful and need to be plugged in...while flash units run on batteries but are not as powerful.

I suggest having a look at Alien Bees for affordable studio lights.
And check out this site for great info about using flash units as off camera lights. http://www.strobist.blogspot.com/

JIP · Feb 13, 2007

I agree Alien Bees has a great starter setup for around $1600 I know that is a little over what you said but check it out. Alien Bees are a favorite of several forums that I have read.

snownow · Feb 13, 2007

JIP said:
I agree Alien Bees has a great starter setup for around $1600 I know that is a little over what you said but check it out. Alien Bees are a favorite of several forums that I have read.

Ditto, I have two now. Light, portable, very good customer service.

Stevedevil · Feb 13, 2007

Hi, as for Studio equipment, always try and go for Digital Gear ( If using Digital Camera ) as the more expensive go into 1/3rd stops to match Digital Camera,
Elinchrom do Kits which include Stands, 2 heads ( 400w ) umbrella,s and softboxes for around £ 750-00 ( $1400-00 ),
Bowens also do their 500w kits for around same money, most include postage worldwide, if you need web pages let me know, Im looking for a set too so if you buy something let me know how you get on with it, Cheers Steve ( UK )

:thumbup:

snownow · Feb 13, 2007

Stevedevil said:
Hi, as for Studio equipment, always try and go for Digital Gear ( If using Digital Camera ) as the more expensive go into 1/3rd stops to match Digital Camera,

Hmm I have heard this on several boards, but not seen any thing to back up that its better or worth the extra $

http://www.alienbees.com/compare.html

JIP · Feb 13, 2007

Huh that's a pretty good site for comparison.

JoRoFoto_Photog · Feb 15, 2007

Big Mike said:
You can go the route of studio lights or the more portable 'hot-shoe' units. The studio lights are more powerful and need to be plugged in...while flash units run on batteries but are not as powerful.

I suggest having a look at Alien Bees for affordable studio lights.
And check out this site for great info about using flash units as off camera lights. http://www.strobist.blogspot.com/

I agree with what Mike is saying.. I currently shoot with both strobe studio lights and my SB600.. yet the fact that the SB600 eats batteries does annoy me.. but hey.. nothing you can do bout it.. prolly doesn't help that I shoot 600-700 shots for every model shoot..

Also, the strobist is an amazing site for lighting tips and help.. I know some photogs who do writeups for the site and swear by it.. its a great learning tool.

benjikan · Feb 15, 2007

subtleRIPPLE said:
Hello there,

I am hoping for help in buying my first lighting kit. I saw a lecture at the nyc photo expo on location lighting and the lights used were SB800s. They sounded pretty great - but I'm not sure if it's the best use of my resources.

As fine artist who just woke up to commercial possibilities, I'm hoping to be earning some income from doing either product, portraiture or on-loaction environmental portraiture,(or other) well, as soon as I can. Is there such a thing as a kit that would work for both studio and on location?

I have a D80 and an older "on camera" Vivitar flash and feel very limited at the moment. The D80 does not have sinc cord outlet so, I image all off camera lighting is done by wireless??? Is the SB800 a good investment for the long term and, good for on location as well as product/studio/ lighting?

I currently do not even own a single lighting stand - so, wise photography gurus, for a start up set up, what should I get for say, ideally $1500 max. (will spend more if long term investment - 5 years applies)

THANK YOU!!!!

For my personal use when not in studio, I use the Multiblitz Digilites. Very lght, powerful and flexible. Just type Multiblitz in to Google and check them out...

Ben

pulpmojo · Feb 20, 2007

there are definately kits that you can use on location as well as in studio, of course you'll be paying a lot more money per watt. If you go with the alien bees for instance, plan on adding on $350 or $500 for the battery pack. The good thing about working outside though is that you typically only need one light, natural light takes care of the rest, of course it has to be powerful enough to overpower the natural light if need be. I usually use two or three lights when I'm in the studio. On location I use a norman allure 320, it's not as powerful as I would like, but it's all I could afford ($426 with battery pack included) I used the rest of my funds to buy a large reflector, 36" softbox, umbrellas, and stands.

fmw · Feb 20, 2007

benjikan said:
For my personal use when not in studio, I use the Multiblitz Digilites. Very lght, powerful and flexible. Just type Multiblitz in to Google and check them out...

Ben

I agree. Monolights are a great value and very flexible. I use the Calumet Travelite 750ws units. They are made by Bowens for Calumet. I have 4 of them plus a 350 w/s unit that I have been using for over 10 years. I use them every day on my product shooting table and the capacitors are charged 24/7. I run them dialed down to 1/8 power and they just run and run. With a couple of those dialed down I'm usually shooting at f22. Really reliable.

I have made commercial shots of RV's on location using this setup of 5 lights and a parachute canopy for a light tent. Trust me, that takes a lot of flash power.

A set of three is around $1500-$1700 and you need to add some money for stands and light modifiers. That's pretty cheap for 2250 watt seconds of power. I can put three of them in a zipper case and fit them in my trunk along with a bag of stands, soft boxes. umrellas, cords etc. Multiblitz like Ben has, Norman, Elinchrome - all of them make similar monolights. They are designed for professional use and are affordable, powerful, tough and reliable.

I used to think they were too light duty for daily professional studio work. After 10 years without a glitch, I've changed my mind. Look seriously at monolights as a flexible solution to studio lighting.

subtleRIPPLE · Feb 21, 2007

I've been away from my computer for the past week, shooting

and am very excited by your replies. I'm wondering if anyone knows if it is possible to print out the whole thread, as I'd like to go through and check out all your suggestions peice by peice - and take my own notes on them. I can't seem to find a way to do this???

Big Mike · Feb 21, 2007

Printing should be a function of your browser, not the forum. So if you are using Internet Explorer...just go up to File, then pick Print.

Or you could just highlight the text, click copy...then open a word processor like Word, and click Paste. Then print from there.