Strobes in a Gym - Questions....

[Croasdail]

Okay - not sure this is in the right place so please move it if needs be. I local college has invited me to shoot the remainder fo their volleyball season and their upcoming basketball season. Great - I need more experience with both of these. They also offered to let me set up stobes.... yikes. I know this is supposed to be a good thing, but I know nothing about using strobes. So if you all can help, I would appreciate it. I have a really dumb question.

I have been shooting indoor sports with a f1.8 lens using ISO 800 achieving between 1/600 and 1/800 shutter speeds - freezing most action. My current cameras synch only to 1/250. So, while I understand I could use a much kinder ISO, it seems I would be giving up some shutter speed. I have seen really nice crisp stuff done with strobes, so I must be missing something here.

Second question.... I say a guy shooting at a recent game with a single stop on a stand in a high school sized gym. Is this normal, do I need two... or more slaves?

Just trying to see if I want to even start down this path.

Cheers

[gmen]

Not something I have direct experience of as it just isn't the done thing in the UK... but these links should help:

http://www.sportsshooter.com/news/81
http://www.sportsshooter.com/news/82
http://www.sportsshooter.com/news/83
http://www.gophotography.net/tips/biglighting.htm
http://pmrphoto.com/%20howto/
http://www.sportsshooter.com/fgardler/gymlights/
http://www.sportsshooter.com/message_display.html?tid=13490

Plenty more info to be found at ss.com if you do a search ("strobe gym") but these should get you started. Bottom line is that you'll need some lights (with reflectors), a set (or two) of pocket wizards, safety cables, gaffer tape galore, clamps and/or stands, access to mains power (unless you are going with a portable battery driven sytstem) and plenty of time to set them up. I would say two lights is a minimum - using just one light is going to make it very hard to control the shadows.

As for freezing the action, shooting at 1/250s is fine because the flash duration of the strobes is (usually) much shorter than that and will stop motion nicely.

It's probably a good idea to hire/borrow the relevant kit at first. It's going to be a reasonably big investment if you want to do this properly.

---- Gavin

[EricKonieczny]

Good Luck with the Strobes, I am looking forward to seeing the results.

At the recent Volleyball match I shot, they made an announcement that NO flash photography was allowed and any offenders would be removed from the premises. :confused:

[Croasdail]

okay - makers sense.... its the period of illumination, not the shutter speed. Lots of reading to do.

Thanks for the detailed response and homework.

Cheers!

Mark

[Croasdail]

So most of the high school shooting I do is in a standard sized gym with white ceilings 40 feet up. I can mount two flashes at about 20 feet up on two platforms, bouncing them from the ceiling... totaling 60 feet of travel. Would a setup like this work - I could see using this since I could use the flashes for other purposes...

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=productlist&A=details&Q=&sku=226523&is=USA&addedTroughType=categoryNavigation

[DwightMcCann]

60 feet is a heck of a long distance for an "on camera" style flash unit, even if you used a shiny parabolic reflector. Even if they had enough power to do some good I would worry that the amount of power required would drain the batteries pretty quickly. Most of the articles I read (thank you Gavin) talked about heavy, wall plug units or significant monolites. I will be very interested in anything you do in this area. Also, you might get better information over in the lighting forum.

[gmen]

So most of the high school shooting I do is in a standard sized gym with white ceilings 40 feet up. I can mount two flashes at about 20 feet up on two platforms, bouncing them from the ceiling... totaling 60 feet of travel. Would a setup like this work - I could see using this since I could use the flashes for other purposes...

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=productlist&A=details&Q=&sku=226523&is=USA&addedTroughType=categoryNavigationAs Dwight says, on-camera type flashes simply aren't really going to cut it in this situation. You're going to need some more powerful units unless you want to be frustrated/disappointed with the results. It's going to be an investment... but you'll be able to use the lights in a studio as well, opening up another world of possibilities.

With regard to possible strobes, I see 'Alien Bees' mentioned a lot in the lighting forum. They might be worth looking at. Over here in the UK, the favoured brands include Elinchrom and Bowens.

Ahhh... EDIT... and another thing. The infra-red system (i.e the ST-E2) is not going to be a reliable trigger in a large space like a gym. You'll need to think about Pocket Wizards: http://www.pocketwizard.com/ to ensure that your flashes fire when you want them to.

Ahhh... EDIT 2... You can forget ETTL as well... don't forget get a flashmeter.

---- Gavin

[Croasdail]

Awe, I think I will go the big glass direction then. RIght now I don't think I would have the occasion enough to use $5-7K worth of lighting equipment. I will keep my eyes out for a good used 200 1.8 which I know I can use. I think I will hire some equipment if need be.

I am going to go for a better metering system though, I am shooting enough now that I just can't spend too much time with old photoshop.

Cheers and thanks for the heads up - keeping me from spending money on something that will not work.

[gmen]

$5-7K I don't think you're looking at anything like that much:

Possible lights and stands: http://www.alienbees.com/beginner.html would probably be a good start point... $720... or even more power: http://www.alienbees.com/b1600.html x2 ...$720 (plus stands of course).

Pocket Wizards: http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=productlist&A=details&Q=&sku=168584&is=REG&addedTroughType=search ...$350

Cheap flash meter: http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=productlist&A=details&Q=&sku=264040&is=REG&addedTroughType=categoryNavigation?...$55 or you could go for a Sekonic L358 + PW module, probably around $300 in total. That would also give you ambient metering for your daytime stuff.

OK... there'll be other bits and bobs... bags, clamps, etc... but should work out around $1500 dollars. No cheap admittedly... but not quite $5-$7k.

See how easy it is for me to spend your money??? :rolleyes: ;)

---- Gavin

[PhotosGuy]

GREAT links, Gavin! Someone should put a link to those in the "Lighting" Sticky.

60 feet is a heck of a long distance for an "on camera" style flash unit, even if you used a shiny parabolic reflector. True if you want f/8. But working "on the cheap", I found that my old Vivitar 283s would give f/4 at ISO 400 at 130' using a focusing filter on the head. I would 2nd the recommendation to use aux power. Also keep in mind that these aren't engineered for a lot of fast sequential flashes at full power & you could burn them up! ;)

[Jon, The Elder]

But what about my Horses?

[PhotosGuy]

But what about my Horses? You should ask an expert. I suggest Mr. Ed! :D

[Croasdail]

Thanks Gavin.... I jumped into the B&H sight last night and of course all most fell out of my chair. I could go to the CFO (my wife) and propose what you outlined. If I can get f4 to f5.6 shooting for indoor, I would be happy with that. If I can shoot f4 indoor, that new L might really work well and cover a lot of range. I could then dump my tamron and the 17-40L which I never use.

PhotosGuy... thanks for chimming in here. I saw a news guy use a single strobe on a stand reflected of the ceiling once... but have no idea how good or evenly lite his stuff was. Thats where I kinda got the idea of the two 520x's... but if spending $600 more gets me the right solution... I owe it to myself to atleast check it out. Will let you all know how this comes out.

[DwightMcCann]

Not that it really pertains here but I have a Bowens QUADX 3000 w/s unit with four heads. Very nice unit, but not cheap. Of course any unit, such as mine, that powers from a central power pack is more difficult to work with than monoblocs with their own power. I could do a grand job of lighting one basket! Anyway, Croasdail, be sure to keep us apprised ... if you start another thread with new pictures or a documentary on what you are doing, please add a link from this thread for those of us who are subscribed.

[gmen]

If I can get f4 to f5.6 shooting for indoorYou should certainly be OK with that, particularly with the more powerful units. I'm looking forward to seeing the results if you decide to run with the strobes ;)

---- Gavin

[blinking8s]

in our gym, i shot 250 @ iso 400 on 5.6

the strobes were high on the ends of the court, bounced off the cieling.

worked pretty good, recycle rate was slow, i like shooting without them much better

[Croasdail]

Getting closer to pulling the trigger here on this project... looking at the AB800x2 or AB400x2. What has me stopping from doing the 800's is the longer flast duration, and from I have learned as you dial it down, the flash duration is actually longer.

So here is my question to you all... as long as flash duration is faster then 1/1200 and I am 3 or 4 stops over ambient light... I should be okay. I shouldn't need 1/6400... or do I - which is the duration of the AB400s. The AB800s are just marginally more expensive and I would prefer to use those dialed down if possible - which should also help with recycle times.

Thanks.