Throwing myself into the fire. Tips needed (AB's and 1dmkIIN)

[D113]

I am doing small studio-style shoot next week.

I will have:

1 x 10X12 wescott backdrop

1 ab ringflash
2 x ab800's with stands

white/black unmbrella
32" brolly

1dmkIIN
macbookpro
PS CS3
LR
EOS Capture


Since i've never done tethered shooting, i will be learning the firewire tethered shooting method shortly.. so no worries there.

Ive read the LR article on thered shooting, so I will be good there too.

My questions are:

1) Did i read correctly in the 1d2n manual that the flsh sync is 1/250th, but for studio lights it's 1/125th? What does this mean?

2) I will likely have to shoot at ISO50-ISO100 and f5.6 to get the DOF i want, due to the amount of light I'll have. The ABRingflash will be coming in from the front, probably at 8ft from the person (waist-upwards shot) and I'll maybe have 4-6 ft of distance from the AB800's to the subject.

-will i likely need to turn my AB's way down at that distance?
-should I consider getting some ND flash the AB800's in case i'm still way too bright?

I want the background to be quite darker, so I should put it more than 6 feet from the subject right? (read a bit at the Strobist Blog)

3) I will be using the ring flash's pc cord, and putting the two ab800's into flash-slave mode. Does this sound ok? there will not be any other light sources to interfere with my setup, so i declined to by radio remotes.

4) should I use a pc connection to one of the AB800's to make it a master instead of the ABringflash?

5) Any other tips?

Thanks very much for looking

Darryl

[Unity Gain]

I am doing small studio-style shoot next week.

I will have:

1 x 10X12 wescott backdrop

1 ab ringflash
2 x ab800's with stands

white/black unmbrella
32" brolly

1dmkIIN
macbookpro
PS CS3
LR
EOS Capture



Damn, nice gear!



1) Did i read correctly in the 1d2n manual that the flsh sync is 1/250th, but for studio lights it's 1/125th? What does this mean?

I'm not familiar with that camera's manual, but that is generally true of all SLR cameras and flash. Sync of 125 is common to safely use studio flash and not have a black frame covering up half of your shot :)


2) I will likely have to shoot at ISO50-ISO100 and f5.6 to get the DOF i want, due to the amount of light I'll have. The ABRingflash will be coming in from the front, probably at 8ft from the person (waist-upwards shot) and I'll maybe have 4-6 ft of distance from the AB800's to the subject.
-will i likely need to turn my AB's way down at that distance?
-should I consider getting some ND flash the AB800's in case i'm still way too bright?


I'm not familiar with the ABs but I have an Elinchrom ringflash that would probably be about F5.6 - F8 at that distance from the subject with the power all the way down. So you might need to cut out some neutral density gels to fit over the ABs just to be safe... But I don't know for sure...Studio Ringflashes are really powerful at those shorter distances



I want the background to be quite darker, so I should put it more than 6 feet from the subject right? (read a bit at the Strobist Blog)


That's gonna be a judgement call on your part during the shoot. But that's probably about right.



3) I will be using the ring flash's pc cord, and putting the two ab800's into flash-slave mode. Does this sound ok? there will not be any other light sources to interfere with my setup, so i declined to by radio remotes.


Sounds like a plan. IF you're shooting in a location that has a built in alarm system then sometimes the IR beams from the alarm will trip your white flash slave lights. Just something to be aware of. For example, I used to do lots of shoots in Casinos and could never use the white flash slaves on my lights because the alarm system would randomly fire them. Other than that, you should be cool.



4) should I use a pc connection to one of the AB800's to make it a master instead of the ABringflash?

Judgement call on your part. I think most people sync to their mainlight...But it really doesn't matter.


5) Any other tips?


Yeah, you might want to do a color balance test with the ringflash by itself. For some reason, my ringflash goes a little magenta if I use the regular flash sync white balance setting on my camera...and it goes blue on the daylight setting...so I need to do a custom white balance for the ring flash. Sometimes this causes me problems when used in conjunction with other lights that are balanced better to daylight. Just a heads up.

Hope that helps...good luck with your shooting!

[Gatorboy]

You can sync at 1/250 with your MKIIN using the ABs. Move the lights close to the subject and/or keep the subject a good distance away to create a dark background.

The AB800s will fire fine from the strobe of the ringflash.

[bwolford]

I use my IIN with a AB800 at 1/250 for some time without any problems. The manual actually says the recommended setting should be 1/125. You won't harm it trying other settings.

[shooterman]

I think the manual reference is talking about big super duper powerful stobes. Typically the more power a strobe packs the longer the flash duration is, at least from the research I've done. You shouldn't have any problems syncing at 1/250th SS with the AB's. That's what I set my camera to and don't have any black bars in my shots.

[D113]

Thanks everyone for your input..it's a big help when you are trying to make something happen "in concept" and can get a bunch of tips up front!

BTW, picking up my Sekonic LS358 meter tonight which should help quite a bit.

Darryl