Well. I'm not as smart as I thought I was and now I've gone and destroyed one of my favorite flashes. I had my Godox AD 200 attached to a 2x3 foot softbox and the assemblage was sitting on top of a light stand, about ten feet above the ground. We were in an equipment yard using giant earth movers as backgrounds for a series of environmental portraits.
There was a very slight breeze so I made sure to weight the light stand with something heavy. I always bring along a bungee cord in my light case so I used my Think Tank camera backpack as a sandbag. I figured the 15 -20 pounds would make a good anchor; a hedge against the random wind gust.
I was also using a 4x4 foot diffuser to keep direct sun off my subjects. That was weighted down with a 30 pound steel pipe. It wasn't going anywhere. But I missed my guess with the lighting unit's safety.
Of course accidents always seem to happen in slow motion if you aren't fast enough to get to the spot and grab the light stand before it hits the ground...
I was too far away when I noticed it's acceleration toward hard dirt covered in more powdery dirt. The light hit squarely on the back end where the little control panel lived. It's a spider web cracked piece of dead plastic now. Amazingly, the flash still worked and we used it for another 400 or 500 images before I was finished at the location. I tested the light today and it still fires and still receives commands and triggering signals from the remote in the hot shoe. I just can't use it without the remote.
Sending it back to the manufacturer for repairs probably makes no sense at all since I'd have to pay shipping in two directions and it will probably take a lot of time to get everything done and turned around. I guess I'll hop online when I get back in town and get another one. They pack down well and put out enough power to go toe to toe with the full sun. They also do HSS with the remote and my Panasonic cameras. That's a nice feature to have.
Maybe they'll have a sale....... just a bit of wishful thinking.....
Here's the main light with the backpack as ballast. I was working out of the rental car;
A Nissan Rogue. I put 4.5 miles on it yesterday....
Here's the standard configuration for my use of the AD200.
If the sun is out then my Chimera diffusion scrim is along for the ride. Gotta keep the harsh
shadows off the "talent."
It's impractical to fly with enough sandbags so you get into the practice of finding
good substitutes at your locations. Two days ago we used a bungee cord and a log to
secure a stand with a diffuser on it. Today it's a metal stanchion.
I should have used a metal stanchion or big steel pipe on this set up but I thought 20 pounds of backpack would do the trick. I was wrong again....
Here's the basic set up. Just add the talent and you are good to go.
I usually try to construct short lighting. It's the most flattering.
Stuff wears out. Sometimes gravity wears it out a lot quicker.
But when everything goes well it's a nice, quick field technique...
7 comments:
This may help protect the new one. http://www.lightsavers.store/
Jeez, that's not what you want while on a paying gig effectively a zillion miles from an actual photo store. At least he kept firing for you!
Since the water you love to swim in weighs 8.3 pounds/gallon are there fillable, collapsable weights you can carry? Found objects seems like a practical option, site-dependant of course, but my clumsy self (or worse, my subject) might well trip over a big hunk o' pipe extending from beneath a stand.
Appreciate your real-life anecdotes--good and bad!
When you get ready to replace the AD 200 note that their extension head adapter (a $45 accessory) enables you to relocate the control screen (and most of the light's weight) lower down the stand. An aside: Godox is getting ready to release a round-head accessory with a spiral flash tube (for about $80) for the 200 that should provide better fill in the softbox, and magnetic attachment of accessories ($80 bucks for the round-head only - http://www.godox.com/EN/Products_Witstro_H200R_Round_Flash_Head.html)
Well... if you weren't such an old fellow, you might have been quick enough to catch the flash before it hit the ground!! ��
Having turned 63 a few months ago I speak from experience.
Happy Birthday!
Looking at your setup, the first thing I notice is the additional complication of potential soil instability. Not sure why I noticed, but I was in Pisa yesterday looking at a tower that similar problems...
Looks like a series of shots being gathered for a new book: On Location Lighting. Not the worst idea. Include solutions for video as well as stills. Publish it yourself and receive 100% of the profit? Oh, there I go again. Stop that! Stop that!
As a full time working photographer, and not in possession of a trust fund, I have nevertheless decided to "self insure" since switching to Godox. Repairing a Nikon Sb for *any* reason always seemed to cost $400 via Nikon Professional Services. Repairing [Insert Foreign Name or Name Resembling An Explosion] high powered flashes sometimes resulted in more than just negative cash flow. It caused wallet-ectomy in some cases. After earlier suffering the same cash-extraction-procedure having to purchase a case full of them.
So with a case full of AD 200's and V860's, with a common trigger, I've reasoned that a fall or a repair needed could more easily and expeditiously be dealt with by tapping-up on my phone one of the million places you can buy these strobes and ... buying another one of these strobes for less than a former repair would cost. They'll bring it to me the next day. I've poked around for repairing one or two in the last 5 years or so I've been Godox.(never did repair the one that blew, without a modifier on it, into a mountain lake). But the Ad 200 really feels like a semi disposable piece of equipment. So I C-Stand and Sandbag Away and always have more than I need with me.
If you go to any of the Facebook groups where these flashes are discussed, and people shoot, almost exclusively, young women with, almost exclusively, shallow depth of field, you'll find that this tipping over issue is epidemic.
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