It is interesting to note how my flash-power requirements have changed with trends in photography. Now that shallow depth of field is trendy, I have a slew of f:1.4 and f:1.8 lenses which I'm using on my D2X. (The 85mm f:1.4 is a honey!) With smaller sensor sizes/decreased magnification, and the resulting increase of DOF, you need very fast and expensive lenses to make your pics look like they were shot on a $5 Lomo. But I do love those natural light, backlit, lifestylish images with shallow DOF that are popular in commercial photography these days. Portraits by window-light at f:2.0 (Carefully focused) knock the spots off those f:22 old-fashioned studio images with perfect light ratios I find that my 2400WS pack is out of service and even my 500W Bowens heads are too powerful to get apertures of f:4 or wider... so I have now bought a collection of ND filters... mmm at 55 I'm a spendoid-trendoid! Still it's cheaper than going 4X5 digital. Before you tell me to shoot large format film and scan it etc... Here in Oman we don't have 4X5 E6 film processing available. Nor do I have a scanner which could handle it. That's all folks herschel >>-----Original Message----- >>From: owner-photoforum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:owner- >>photoforum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Jason Davis >>Sent: Thursday, March 20, 2008 5:10 AM >>To: List for Photo/Imaging Educators - Professionals - Students >>Subject: Looking to buy some strobe flashes >> >>Hello, >> I'm a total newb at lighting. I have rented some strobes and I really >>like playing with them. But its costing me $125 a day for 2 lights , >>umbrellas , stands , battery pack, >>wireless sync thing.. >> >>I have no clue if thats a good price or not.. Anyway , I see lots of >>affordable lights for sale on the internet , and the owner of the >>store i rent from offerd me 2 >>300w/s strobe heads for $700. I cant remember the brand name :\ To >>finaly get to the ponit... :p Can you guys point me at some >>information for beginners looking >>to buy lights? Stuff that can help me figure out what i want/need and >>information to help me know what kind of price I should look to pay. >> >>Thank You, >>Jason
