best portable Flash setup

[chr15w]

Im thinking of buying a portable flash system to take potraits/small groups at

weddings and possibly function evenings etc

I would be looking for at least 2 heads with soft boxes and brollies,a good

size backdrop holder. It would have to be reasonably portable and as its a bit

of a suck it and see purchase I dont think Im into Bowens/Elinchrom territory.

It would also be useful if it could be fired by radio from Canon cameras.

Can I have any ideas on what is/is not recomended(I think a budget of around

�500/$900 would be about right)

[ben_rubinstein___mancheste1664880652]

If you are in the UK then you might want to look at the new D-lite 2's from Elinchrom at 399 pounds for the two light kit including stands, reflectors and brollies. They are small and light and I know of one wedding photographer working in my market who says they are all he needs for an on location kit. That will leave you 100 qud for background stands, the manfrotto ones are the lightest though they are not as cheap as the more bulky Interfit ones (I just bought a second set of the interfit for 100 pounds!) That hasn't left you anything in budget for the backdrop itself but to be honest it's better spending realistically upfront than trying to economise and ending up spending double in the future as you replace your below spec kit which didn't meet your needs in the real world.

 

If you are in the US then you can't go wrong with a set of two Alien Bees B800 lights, I had them brought over here to the UK (they will make them to order for 220V for only $10 more) until Elinchrom bring out the more powerful D-lites there is nothing in the UK that can come close to matching them for all round versatility/weight/price. I bought them before D-lites existed so I wouldn't recommend going that route now. Buy something with a UK warranty.

 

Most modern strobes have a built in light slave that you can trigger from your canon flash by switching it to manual mode and winding the power all the way down to minimum. You cannot fire them using the light slave when shooting in ETTL period. Again most modern strobes can be fired using radio slaves which will plug into your canon's PC socket or sit on the hotshoe.

[ben_rubinstein___mancheste1664880652]

If you want a really small and portable setup then you could buy a couple of used 550ex flashguns (I'm selling one at present) and use wireless ETTL, buy an attachment to fit them to stands with a brolly (jessops sell them for 18 quid each) and attach them to stands as you would strobes then fire them from your on camera flash which is set to trigger the slaves but not fire itself.

 

To be honest though, the quality of light isn't as good, the setup has far less control than manually metered strobes and it is an expensive option. I had to resort to exactly this setup when I found out at the last wedding as I was setting up that my assistant had broken off the plug tips off both radio slaves inside my AB's rendering them totally useless. I set up a 580ex and a 550ex on stands shooting into umbrellas and triggered them from my 580ex on camera. Although you can set ratios technically, in the real world it is pretty hard to use and if the slaves are on a B or C channel then you have to adjust exposure compensation on each unit, you can't do it from the camera except for channel A. That means that when shooting a bride in white you have to dial in the exposure compensation to each unit and then set the ratio. A real pain in the bum when with manually metered strobes the exposure and ratio are set and metered whatever the subject matter.

[chr15w]

Thanks for your reply . I am in the uk and have just bought a 550ex as a backup for my 580ex otherwise I would have bought yours!

there seems alot to consider with this type of setup so Im really grateful for any advice

[scott levine]

Take a ride over to a Calumet photographic and look at a Bowens Kit. There should be

something in your price range with two monolites. They are extremely reliable and strait

forward to use. I have used Bowens/Calumet monolites as well as Packs & heads for over 20

years and they are worth the money.