Sorry for the lateness of this reply. I am a fan of Photogenic, and I know they make an inexpensive, low power monolight system, but the name of it eludes me at the moment. For camera flash units, you can get brackets that mount to a light stand, and hold the flash in a shoe, and clamp either an umbrella or soft box seperately, so there is no strain put on the flash. I have an 800ws box and cable set with 4 heads. It is lots of power for 35mm, adequate for medium format (for large groups I will use 400 iso film), and can be used for large format portraits, but it isn't quite enough power to do it well. Another power pack would help.
Generally, hair lights are snooted down so they don't shine directly into the lens, which can cause flare. I like to put a grid in behind the snoot. I find the added texture it puts into the hair to be nice. I think you are correct about 400ws being enough for a mono light for general purposes based on my own experience. You can do a lot with one mono light for a main, and a reflector for fill, and you never have to worry about your fill ratio being to strong. A camera type flash mounted above the subject with a cardboard flag to keep light off the camera lens works fine as a hair light. William Robb ----- Original Message ----- From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Friday, September 26, 2003 3:24 PM Subject: Getting into studio strobes; what to do with my 120J ? > Hi fellow Pentax users, > > I have been studying online how to work with studio > lighting, and I rented a 400ws monolight over the > weekend to try things out. My girlfriend, as always, > was the real photographer, but now she can > concentrate with her photography with my full > support in lighting. She borrowed a digital camera > to immediately see the effects. We rented a hotel > room to do portraits for a couple who's just got > married, and some glamour/lingerie for another lady. > We used these friends as guinea pigs for our > experiments. > > I have a bunch of hot shoe flashes, the top of which > was a 120J TTL. That day I just pointed that to the > roof at 1/16 power, and it wasn't doing anything but > trigger the real strobe. I have a small Vivitar 4600 > bare bulb flash with built-in slave. I was expecting > it could serve as background light or fill light or > whatever, but it was a total failure for the 4600. I > just didn't have the proper reflector to use it > effectively. > > The 120J has about 150ws already. I was thinking, > maybe I could do something to use it as a hairlight, > a background light or a fill light. But what do I > need in order to make that happen ? First I need a > stand, but how do I put a shoe mount flash on a > light stand ? As a side note I also do music and is > there some stands out there which can hold both > microphones and lights. Well forget that if it is a > stupid idea. > > I guess I would need honeycomb or barn doors for > hair light... The 120J has a norman type reflector. > And then I would need a slave trigger for it. Am I > missing anything ? > > I didn't rent a softbox, but is the weight of a soft > box supported by the strobe or by the stand ? Sorry > for such a stupid question but I am still a > beginner. The 120J won't be able to hold anything heavy. > > Throughout that day I seldom use the flash I rented > past 1/2 power and I've heard there was a rule of > thumb to buy twice the power as you need so 400ws > seems to be just right. We are getting apertures > like f/22 with ISO 100 film but my girlfriend says > she likes that and sometimes we use medium format > which requires a smaller f-stop. I want to limit my > investment to one monolight at this time because I > want to master one light, and plus the 120J I > already have at the most (2 lights) before I acquire > more gear. Any recommendations on good/inexpensive > monolights are greatly appreciated. (For 1-2 people > portraits and glamour.) > > Any other tips ? Thanks in advance. > -- > Bo-Ming Tong > > >
