studio lights and canon flashe + gels

[Shelley]

I have been playing (and learned heaps along the way). I just assumed it was impossible to get my 580exII flash to fire with my studio lights and ranger quadra as other photographers said it was not possible. I knew it may be possible if I went down the road of pocketwizards - someone might confirm that it is. I just didn't want to go down that path and expense. edit: I have 2 580exII plus a nissin flash.

I discovered that if I use my 580exII as the master on my camera hotshoe (enabled flash or when disabled), it still set my ranger lights off as well and I could use ettl on my flashes (though not sure as yet what the studio lights will do) - I could also get hi-speed by doing this. The hi-speed doesn't seem to be right though on the ranger light. I have action set of ranger and can go to shutterspeed of 1/1600. The power from the lights on my ranger when using hi-speed is greatly reduced - I know that you lose 2 stops in flash power by going to hi-speed - but it seems not right.

The revelation for me is that I have more lights to use now - useful for white backgrounds. I had asked around and googled, yet I did not find this answer anywhere, I just stumbled upon it with trying lots of different things.

Gels:

I have been told by lots of people not to bother with. But, I am finding gels have a place with speedlights. I particularly like faking sunlight when its not available, on your subject. What do you think?

[Brian500au]

Hi Shelley

I have found a couple of ways to mix up the quadra's with the speedlites. Last week my skyport trigger stop working (just a setup switch) so I had to find another way to fire my quadras. I set the quadras to fire optically and set them of with the speedlites. I set the speedlite off with a pixel king trigger so I could adjust the power in camera.

Now I have the skyport correctly setup - I am am going to try setting the pixel king trigger on my hotshoe (so I can adjust the power level of my 580's from the camera) with the skyport on top of the pixel king (and therefore can adjust the power of the quadras from the skyport). The 580's should trigger the quadras but I think I may even run a sync cable from the camera body to the skyport so I am not relying on the optical trigger of the quadra.

I have a couple of beach shoots coming up in the next few weeks so will be interesting to see if I have enough portable power available.

[Shelley]

Thanks Brian - be interested on how you go. It sounds complicated, but actually trying I find, it starts to sink in to my brain - sometimes its overload. I don't have any triggers as yet - but I guess its something I will need to look at. I might look at the pixel king trigger I think, especially if you are successful.

All the best with the beach shoots and may you have heaps of portable power at your fingertips :)

[Wayne]

I fire my Ranger RX Speed AS and my SB-900's via the PW route. I get shutter speeds with clean frame well above 1/2000 and the Ranger is still like a sun. I can also change power settings on the Ranger and SB-900's from the camera. I know it is the expensive way, but it is the best way.

[Brian500au]

Wayne are you using the "S" heads or the "A" heads on the ranger system?

[KLi]

Can't you just trigger your ranger normally and set your 580 on optic slave mode? And why shouldn't you bother with gel? They give you more option for background and helps with colour correcting on location.

[Shelley]

The 580 ex2 does not have optic slave, have to put some sort of trigger on the flash, wish I could do that kLi. I know other brands you can such as Nikon. Correct me if I am wrong, I have been trying to trigger them.

Yes you are right re. Gels I am going to buy some. There is a lot to learn, I think I have learnt heaps by trial and error. Mixing of flash with tungsten, fluorescent lights etc. it makes sense to use gels.