jlafferty wrote:
Your shots look good, but for the title, to each their own.
I'm so glad to have given up corded monolights and all the complications that come with dealing with location power - finding the working outlets, dragging extension cords, taping/bagging them down. Good riddance.
Swapping out a battery takes 30 seconds and the first one goes on the charger - I just keep them rotating indefinitely.
Modeling lights are for sure convenient and in some extreme cases even necessary, but just catching reflections in eyeglasses? I'm cool using an LED clamped to my key, or setup nearby on its own stand
Curious with all your misfires - are you using the Pro transmitter, or the older XT1 or whatever they're called? 30-40 is high, even for a 3000 shot day, especially for subjects that aren't really moving much.
All that said, it's good to be happy with your tools and workflow. Congrats on finding your groove.
Something I didn't mention that has been bugging me with my older Godox AD600 (about two years old) is that it's starting to do random shifts in tint - like one frame out of sequence will have a tint shift. I have a spare bulb so swapped it out, but not sure if it's just from using them hard for 8 hours at a time of continuous shooting or because of an aging bulb, or just an aging strobe. I have been using the latest Xpro trigger for Godox (which I've found has pretty poor battery life for whatever reason) and switching out to to channel 2 or 3 helps a little bit. Typically what happens is just the fill/kicker will fire and not the key.
As for the plug-in vs battery power, I generally much much prefer battery powered strobes for shoots - regardless of whether I'm doing headshots at someone's office, or on location doing a commercial shoot. I have B1s as well, and they are typically what I pack for commercial location shoots.
For this specific client, we are typically in a dedicated event space with a crew that runs power to wherever I need, tapes it down, etc which is a huge convenience and a bit unusual. Swapping batteries isn't a problem for me as I do have extra ones for my B1s - but I've found that running the modeling light on the B1s drastically reduce their battery life (and it doesn't seem worthwhile considering how relatively weak it is compared to the D1 modeling light). This is a somewhat unusual/extreme workflow, as I have less than 5 minutes per person, so having a strong modeling light to check for reflections in glasses and get a sense of how the light looks as it goes from frontal to side has helped me keep my output quality consistent. All of the event spaces we've been shooting in have been well lit too, so the D1 modeling light has been the only one that's actually been visible.
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stevesanacore wrote:
There is no question that using my B1's and not having to depend on looking for outlets and carrying extension cords is a major leap in location work. I could never go back to using only AC powered lights anymore and will add more B1's as my old Compacts and D1's wear out. Technology has given us another major boost to make our jobs easier.
Totally agree! I just wish the B1s had some sort of provision for an AC adapter for certain use cases. I'm just hoping the B2s drop in price more so I can justify picking a couple up - right now it doesn't make sense for me to buy them considering they are about the same price as a B1 used. My entire Godox kit (two ad600s and two ad200s) cost me less than on B2!
Re: Profoto D1s better than Godox for long sessions
jlafferty wrote:
Your shots look good, but for the title, to each their own.
I'm so glad to have given up corded monolights and all the complications that come with dealing with location power - finding the working outlets, dragging extension cords, taping/bagging them down. Good riddance.
Swapping out a battery takes 30 seconds and the first one goes on the charger - I just keep them rotating indefinitely.
Modeling lights are for sure convenient and in some extreme cases even necessary, but just catching reflections in eyeglasses? I'm cool using an LED clamped to my key, or setup nearby on its own stand
Curious with all your misfires - are you using the Pro transmitter, or the older XT1 or whatever they're called? 30-40 is high, even for a 3000 shot day, especially for subjects that aren't really moving much.
All that said, it's good to be happy with your tools and workflow. Congrats on finding your groove.
Something I didn't mention that has been bugging me with my older Godox AD600 (about two years old) is that it's starting to do random shifts in tint - like one frame out of sequence will have a tint shift. I have a spare bulb so swapped it out, but not sure if it's just from using them hard for 8 hours at a time of continuous shooting or because of an aging bulb, or just an aging strobe. I have been using the latest Xpro trigger for Godox (which I've found has pretty poor battery life for whatever reason) and switching out to to channel 2 or 3 helps a little bit. Typically what happens is just the fill/kicker will fire and not the key.
As for the plug-in vs battery power, I generally much much prefer battery powered strobes for shoots - regardless of whether I'm doing headshots at someone's office, or on location doing a commercial shoot. I have B1s as well, and they are typically what I pack for commercial location shoots.
For this specific client, we are typically in a dedicated event space with a crew that runs power to wherever I need, tapes it down, etc which is a huge convenience and a bit unusual. Swapping batteries isn't a problem for me as I do have extra ones for my B1s - but I've found that running the modeling light on the B1s drastically reduce their battery life (and it doesn't seem worthwhile considering how relatively weak it is compared to the D1 modeling light). This is a somewhat unusual/extreme workflow, as I have less than 5 minutes per person, so having a strong modeling light to check for reflections in glasses and get a sense of how the light looks as it goes from frontal to side has helped me keep my output quality consistent. All of the event spaces we've been shooting in have been well lit too, so the D1 modeling light has been the only one that's actually been visible.
---------------------------------------------
stevesanacore wrote:
There is no question that using my B1's and not having to depend on looking for outlets and carrying extension cords is a major leap in location work. I could never go back to using only AC powered lights anymore and will add more B1's as my old Compacts and D1's wear out. Technology has given us another major boost to make our jobs easier.
Totally agree! I just wish the B1s had some sort of provision for an AC adapter for certain use cases. I'm just hoping the B2s drop in price more so I can justify picking a couple up - right now it doesn't make sense to buy them considering they are about the same price as a B1 used.
Jun 08, 2018 at 11:30 AM
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