Portable Strobes???

[neonmike]

Up until just recently I've never had a need to use studio strobes. My studio equipment consists of two 500 watt hat lights wit bounce umbrellas and a 250 watt hair light. However, my town has recently finished building a bike trail that passes under a few bridges. I'd love to use these bridges and the trail in a shoot. Obviously I can't run my gear there.

So I'm looking to invest in a decent starterset of portable Battery Strobes. What should I look for and can anyone suggest a good place to buy? I have about $1000 but don't really wanna go that high unless I really need too. I've seen a few speedlight kits that seem really flexible but I'm skeptical of how effective they are. Anyone have any experience with these?

Thanks in advance for any help.

[jerryph]

Sorry that I did not see this earlier, Mike. I have experience with speedlights and let me tell you that obviously, lack of brute force power is their downfall... however, if you understand the limitations, 2-3 good quality speedlights working together can accomplish 90% of your lighting needs.

To get an idea of what to do/get or how to use it, feel free to ask me more questions, but also visit www.strobist.com as this is the BEST source of lighting info for speedlights on the market. Look/study/read the Lighting 101 and 102 articles... TONS of information!

Reliable/dependable places to buy are B&H Photo, Adorama, Ritz, Amazon (careful, amazon is the front end for a potential bad dealer too, but I have had lots of positive experiences with them). B&H and Adorama are considered the best 2 places to purchase from... but don't let that stop you from researching for deals from elsewhere.

Are you Nikon, Canon or something else?

[tpanchan]

Mike, I always use my strobe outdoor. I bought a portable power specially for strobes online. I saw it in POTN and check the distributor. It is being shipped from the Philippines.
You might want to check the tronix explorer xt. Here's the link
www.innovatronix.com (http://www.innovatronix.com/explorerXT.asp)
google it and you will see a few reviews of the product and it costs less that $500.

It works great with my Elinchrom DLite4

[jerryph]

First off, it is VERY important to be careful which inverter is used. If you use constant on lighting (ick!), almost anything will do, but with 110V studio strobes, you must have a very specific kind of inverter, else you basically do not get the flash to sync and eventually you damage your strobes (the Explorer that you show is one of the ones that is great for strobes).

Also, one doesn't need to go to the Phillippines for a good portable battery pack. I picked one up from Alien Bee, its called a Vagabond II battery pack (goes for under $300US too!). I also own a 1,000 W/s studio strobe (Photogenic 2500DR) with this battery pack and it is good enough to give me 450 full power shots or 900 shots on 1/2 power. Let me put it to you this way... most of the time, the studio head is at 1/2 power or less outdoors or at it's lowest setting of 31 W/s indoors, diffused and gelled when I am doing weddings in the reception halls. That battery pack is good for thousands of shots before needing a recharge under those conditions.

If you need more power (I do not really see why or how), you can attach a car battery to the inverter (which I carry with me as well), and it will basically let me do over 1,000 full power flashes before needing a recharge.

HERE (http://www.alienbees.com/VIIsystem.html) is info on the battery pack and HERE (http://jerryphpics.blogspot.com/2009/05/big-guns.html) is a little info on my studio head.

I still love and constantly use my battery powered flashes 80% of the time... but when I want to overpower the sun or shoot during times where speedlights are all but useless, I bring out the battery pack and pro quality studio head.

[tpanchan]

Hi Jerry, I've heard about Vagabond II before but decided to purchase Explorer XT online instead.

I saw your blog and thank you for sharing it. Now I am checking the photogenic website to check if they still have that promo.LOL
Seriously, I am thinking of buying a new strobe, planning to buy Calumet Genesis but since I saw your blog on Photogenic, I gonna check it out. Looking for a new strobe that will work with my Explorer, I think that photogenic will.

Thanks

[jerryph]

I've had the chance to recently test out the Explorer on my 2500DR and it works, if that is still a concern for you. :)