I have both a set of four AB800s which I leave set-up in my home studio but use only occasionally for studio work and a pair of 580ex speedlights with small DIY modifiers I use for everything else. The decision to roll that way was for me based primarily on logistics: shooting alone and not wanting to shlep and set-up / tear-down a lot of gear.
The logistical pros/cons of using your current set-up vs. speedlights would depend largely on how you plan to use the speedlights: bracket and single OCF or on two light stands with your current modifiers.
When a fill light is planted on a stand on ground it\'s like throwing out the anchor of a boat, dictating were the camera must be to have the shots well filled. Changing camera position and maintaining the same lighting on a face requires moving two stands which is logistically cumbersome.
The primary advantage I see in speedlights is they are small and light enough to keep the fill source mounted over the camera on a bracket which makes centered fill wherever the camera goes a no brainer. I learned that approach 40 years ago working as assistant / second shooter for Monte Zucker who popularized the use of dual flash for wedding coverage with fill on the camera bracket and the key light on a rolling stand: a modified medical IV stand. I still that approach with my Canon 580ex flashes because having tried everything else over the years I haven\'t found a better balance of results and simple logistics, allowing me to use manual, ETTL and HSS with fingertip control over ratio and exposure. My single flash and backlit dual flash shots shots automatically have flattering \"butterfly\" modeling on the faces and my \"short lit\" dual flash shots are ideally filled. In addition to keeping the fill light moving in tandem with the roving camera automatically, Zucker\'s idea of putting the OCF on a compact rolling stand makes using two flashes single-handed for \"run and gun\"photo-journalistic lighting tasks like wedding receptions practical. See: http://photo.nova.org/CanonPracticalUsage/
So based on what has worked for me and on that basis I suggest keeping your current gear AND buying speedlights tailoring them as two different lighting solutions: speedlights as your \"run and gun\" bracket-based-fill lighting solution and the studio gear available for situations for static shooting situations where the logistics of set-up/tear-down would be about the same regardless of which you used. Having both sets of tools there will be fewer situations where you find yourself trying to work around the physical limitations of your gear.
Jan 11, 2012 at 08:01 AM
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