Thanks for your comment and opinion. I have to dissagree with you on some issues. A Speedlight, because of it’s inbuilt optical zoom can put out as much punch as a big flash system when used directly. I use the Bron Mobil 1200Ws and both systems bare faced are comparable. With soft boxes or beauty dishes the big flash wins hands down.

Some of my best images were shot at 1/4000th second and flashed using Speedlights and Pocket Wizard. Even in full sunlight it is quite easy to make the ambient 2 or 3 stops under at these settings. Anyway, what really matters is we find kit we can use to make our pictures the way we want them. One photographers Range Rover is anothers Ferari.

Enjoy your picture making,

Damien.

I’m glad the Radio Poppers are working well for you. We are having a fab time with the advanced functionality of the PW products like the increase in efficiency that accurate flash timing generates. Shooting at f/4 and 1/4000th second in sunlight and getting the extra umph of power over the standard HSS system is a revelation. The Longer range that the RPs have is definately an advantage though. I just can’t see the RPs taking off in the UK. When WEX and Jacobs etc decide they are worth the risk then that situation might change.

Thanks, Damien.

I hope you are all sorted now.

Regards, Damien.

Thanks for the prompt response.

I have tried that and still having issues. I even had to go down to 1/320th as the sync completely lost it… lol

Having done a factory reset the PW’s seem only happy on the 550 @ 1/1250.

Very strange…. I will be getting in touch with PW and seeking their guidance as this surely cant be right….

Once this is sorted I may well end up on one of your courses, would have been sooner but there is no rest for the wicked…

John

You don’t select ‘H’ on the Speedlights thats the problem. Just leave them set as normal. Let the PW take care of high speed sync and you will have no banding. Selecting H uses the canon system hence the banding etc.

Regards,

Damien.

Firstly, thanks for sharing knowledge and putting together some great DVD’s.

I just bought myself 2x TT5′s and a Mini TT1 for Canon and use the 550EX & 430EX Speedlights. Now, with the HyperSync function of the PW’s I am having a few issues getting them to sync above 1/1250sec whilst mounted on the TT5′s…

Anything higher I get banding on the 5DmkI & 30D.

I have selected the “H” for Highspeed on both flashes and yet nada… zilch,,, etc…

Dont suppose you have any ideas??

My PWs are behaving themselves now. The Canon and the Nikon ones. As you say, liberating

Kindest regards,

Damien.

I’m now using them at nearly every wedding I shoot. They’re creatively liberating (particularly once you’ve watched the Speedlight Mastery DVD.)

Definitely worth the investment in time and money.

All the best,

David

There is no remote power adjustment facility on the Bron Mobil pack. The big packs yes, but not the Mobil.

Damien.

The Pocket Wizards go through periods of working fine the not working fine. It seems that the software keeps getting updated and then new firmware is released to match new camera models. All this tinkering means that for periods of weeks at a time I’m left with a system that is flakey at best. I’ve tried downgrading to previous firmware versions but to no avail. I just wish they got it working and left it alone. The ST-E2 just works with any Canon and I can’t see why the introduction of radio should be so damn complicated. I can barely understand what all the options mean and I’m quite technically minded. So the short answer is the PWs work occasionally but there is no better system available at the moment. I’ve decided not to stock the Nikon PWs until they do exactly what they should do. The Canon units have been such a pain for us. Mine are going to be checked out over the Christmas holidays and hopefully they will come back working just fine. I will then not tinker with firmware updates and the like for ever more!

Cheers,

Damien.

It’s not a problem being a Nikon user I have a D700 and the HSS technologies are similar.

The tiny fraction you describe is 1/12th full power at 1/4000th, (Three and a bit stops). Yes it’s a loss of power, but to get access to f/2.8 and action stopping 1/4000th second it’s worth it. I use a Broncolor Mobil flash and it is about 20x the power of a Nikon SB-900 so there’s plenty of power in hand.

Regards,

Damien.

How on earth does this work? The full power flash duration of an SB800 speedlight is 1/320 (measured actual, not the incorrect figure in Nikon’s literature) so shooting at 1/4000 you must get only a tiny fraction of the flash power. I just tried it using SU-4 mode to trigger and the reduction in flash power is so huge that it hardly registers at all even at f/4! Using high speed sync (FP-mode) is even worse in my tests.

What magic is there in these triggers that lets the flash do a full power dump at such fast shutter speeds?

Love the pics and find your work very inspiring. Just one small question, do you always zoom the speedlight heads to 105?

I’ve been practicing with different setups and have tried some variations to the zoom usually between 50-105. I was just curious what you do.

Thanks. Nelson

I shoot in all modes but when there is little light changing going on or I’m shooting off camera flash using TTL I have my camera set to Manual.

It’s horses for courses and I’m getting very quick at shooting M through a lot more practice this year.

I use multi patterned metering. This does effect the flash TTL exposures. Spot metering is always to be avoided.

I hope this helps, Damien.

Interesting to read how you now shoot in Manual mode.

Out of interest which metering mode do you use with your Canon gear? I believe that it can make a difference to the end image.