Comments on: Which softbox kit is best for me ? 300 w or 600w?

By: Caoedhen

Caoedhen — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 05:18:59 +0000

For any flash application, be it hot shoe or monolight or strobe, *always* get the most power your pocket book will allow. It is always better to have more power than you need, than to need more power than you have. A softbox is going to rob you of 1.5-2 stops worth of light right off the bat, making those 300w/s monolights have to fire at full power every time to get enough light. The 600w/s lights may have to fire at 1/2 power, or possibly even less. The advantage to this is twofold: faster recycle to the next shot, and increase in flash tube life because it doesn't have to work so hard for each shot. If you camera does not have a pop-up flash, it will have a hot shoe and a PC socket. Any light set you buy will come with a PC cable, usually 10-15 feet long, letting you trigger one light from the camera, and any other lights via their optical slave. You can use a Pocket Wizard on your camera and another on one flash in the same manner, or you can put a receiver on all of the lights. For a home studio, where you should be the only person setting off a flash, the optical slaves will work just fine.
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By: Master Road

Master Road — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 04:30:59 +0000

You didn’t say what strobes you are looking at here so I will keep this somewhat general in answer. (Alien Bees and Impact are my own favorites)

The 600wps will allow you to adjust downward, also consider that your softbox will diffuse the light to a degree as well. That said, I would go for the 600wps set. Also, look into a shoot through umbrella… I think you’ll like it.

As for firing. There are a number of different options. Most decent strobes will fire IR. You can trigger them remotely with your flash or by a wireless unit. Other options are to cable them to your camera (a pain, but effective) If you choose to fire them via a hotshoe mounted flash, look into a grip so that your flash is off to the side and you may want to consider a diffuser for your flash.

Happy shooting
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By: Mark

Mark — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 03:49:59 +0000

Go for the higher 600 watts per second kit. You can reduce light more if needed with that kit but if you get the one with less power and need more light then you will be in a much tougher spot.

My 2 cents.

Mark
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By: fhotoace

fhotoace — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 03:14:59 +0000

Actually you seem to be talking about the watt/second specification of your flash units. Higher is better since you can always cut back on the output, but not increase it. 600 w/sec is a power unit that you will be able to use in the most variety of applications.

If you had been asking about incandescent lamps, my answer would be 750 watts.
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