Following the advice of the oh-so-wise Thomas Van Veen, I set myself up with Alien Bees when I was in the US for my GFM trip. They were awesome. I then sold off most of my gear when I "retired" from photography, circa 2007, and have just finished re-enabling myself with a studio set up. I researched the market heavily and was planning on spending the big bucks to make sure that "this time" I did it correctly. What I ended up doing was going back to Alien Bees! I looked at Elinchrom, I looked at Bowens, I looked at a zillion other brands and the thing that had me back to Alien Bees is the way they are built. They are TOUGH. They are designed to be tough. They also now have an Aussie distributor who happens to only be a few suburbs from me, which is even better! They also come in pink! Hehehe. Oh, and did I mention that they cost waaaay less than the big name brands? They are also easy to get accessories for - most Soft Boxes etc come with White Lightening or ABs adapters (or can be purchased separately to suit). So, I just set myself up with their Vagabond battery pack (which can be used anywhere in the world!), 2 x 400w ABs in black, and 2 x 800w ABs in pink - the whole lot cost me about aud$2k as compared with about $5-$6k for the equivalent in a Bowens set up. I am now trying to decide if I will go for their Commander system for my radio triggers or Pocket Wizards with the dedicated AB adapter thingy. (I've been using Cactus and they are just that - CACTUS. Absolute SHITE. Don't waste your $$$). The Pocket Wizards have the advantage of being able to transmit directly to my Sekonic light meter, but cost more. ABs also have their new fancy schmancy "Einstein" heads but they aren't yet available in Australia. Supposedly before Christmas though.
Anyways, that's my take, and my plan is that by Christmas I will have my studio set up complete with my new radio triggers, a nice long softbox, possibly a purpose built product table, and of course, my new K-5 to round it all out! Woot! Then, next year, will be the "year of the lens" for me! Tanya Love Photographer www.lovebytes.com.au m: 0458 006 740 -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Larry Colen Sent: Tuesday, 5 October 2010 4:53 AM To: Pentax-Discuss Mail List Subject: Re: About Studio Lighting kinds On Oct 4, 2010, at 11:45 AM, John Sessoms wrote: > > > If you're looking for "bang for the buck", check out White Lightnings or Alien Bees. I'm not sure if they sell White Lightnings in Europe, but I'm pretty sure they do sell the Alien Bees there. I will vouch for the exceptional service at Paul C Buff. -- Larry Colen [email protected] sent from i4est -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
