Help With Boom

Depends on how far out you need to boom the light. I would think for a speed light and an umbrella, something like this c-stand would be what you want if portability is not the key factor.

http://www.bhphotovide​o.com …ster_Century_C_​Stand.html

Image from this thread
http://www.talkphotogr​aphy.co.uk …s/showthread.ph​p?t=248122

A proper boom arm is larger (length and diameter) than grip arm. It will have a spigot (light mount) on one end and some manner to hang a counter weight on the other.
A grip arm usually will be smaller (length and diameter), will have a grip head on one end and no means to mount a counterweight on the other. You can use a grip arm as a small boom buy purchasing a "baby pin" which will allow you to mount a light. If you want to mount a speedlight you'd need a camera plate, which is designed to attach to a spigot and hold a camera or speedlight.

If you look in these two pictures, you'll see a proper boom arm (chrome) and under it you'll see a black, slim grip arm.

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Here is a link to a grip arm kit:http://www.amazon.com …&psc=1&smid=ATV​PDKIKX0DER

...and here is a boom arm:http://www.amazon.com …ds=avenger+d600​+mini+boom

Hey Brandon,

I see that this post is a few moths old, but I thought I'd trow my hat in the ring anyway.

If you eventually want to move up to a einstein with a medium or large soft/octa box (something I work with a lot... einstein + 47" octa), I would highly suggest a true boom arm plus a drop down pin and a sturdy stand or a good combi boom stand. I'll explain the differences below.
A grip arm works fine for lighter things that you don't need to boom out more than a couple of feet. But once you start getting into heavier fixtures, you'll want something surdy and reliable to hold that weight out over the talent.

Here is my go-to location/studio boom. It's an Avenger A2030D turtle base c stand with an Avenger D600 mini boom plus an E700 baby drop down pin supporting a White Lightning x1600 with the PCB 47" octa. The light is boomed out about 6 ft over the talent.
I've got a 15lb homemade sandbag on the high leg of the stand plus another 15lbs sandbag hanging from the other end of a the boom arm acting as a counterweight. Here's the setup in action (sorry it's not a better angle so you could see more of the arm):

For this stand and boom, I use THIS BAG to haul them around to shoots. The stand's base comes off and I can store two stands plus the boom easily.

The properly balanced counterbalance brings the weight of the load back over the center shaft of the stand thereby reducing the risk of it tipping over. I've got the other bag on the leg just to make sure.
The baby drop down pin is designed to bring the weight of the light fixture directly under the boom arm so there is a greatly reduced torque from the fixture wanting to do it's thing with gravity.

The difference between a boom arm (like the D600) and a combi-boom is that the combi-boom is a stand and a boom in one. Take for example, the Avenger 4050CS (pictured below). It can act a regular (if not humongous) light stand or the top two risers can do a fancy mechanical dance and become a boom. Now, I'm not suggesting you get a combi-boom that's this big. There are plety of smaller ones that will be capable of holding the weight of a studio monoblock + large modifier. I just happened to have this one to hold some heavy video lighting fixtures I have.

Here is the combi-boom at work holding the main light, and in the background you can see my A2030D + D600 combo supporting the hair light:


You can see the E700 drop down pin on the 4050CS doing it's job by holding the weight of the light out under the boom arm so that gravity doesn't cause any unnecessary torque on the arm.
You might also notice I've got a safety cable running around the boom arm and the light so just in case the hardware holding the light fails, the fixture doesn't come crashing down on the talent. If you plan to start booming things a lot, GET SOME SAFETY CABLES! These ones I linked are cheap, well made, and long enough for most applications. No reason not to get them at that price!

Now, I would highly highly highly recommend that no matter what brand of stand you buy (and I know I'll catch some flack for this one...), you go with a steel stand vs an aluminium one for heavier lights and modifiers (> 7lbs), especially if you plan on booming out more than 3 or 4 feet.
If you go to B&H and take a look at the spec sheets, steel stands will be able to support more weight with the booms fully extended than almost all of their similarly sized aluminium counterparts. (I'm sure there are a few exceptions, but they are rare).
Is steel heavy? Yes.
Is it kind of a pain in the a** lugging it around to do location gigs? Yes, but at least it's a good workout : ) .
Is it more expensive than aluminum? Yes.
However, none of those things matter when you consider that if you invest in some quality support for your lights, you'll never have to worry about booming out that $500 fixture only to have the stand fail and that $500 come crashing down on top of your talent.

Hopefully that helped a litte. Or maybe you've made your purchase already. If so, what'd you end up getting? Would love to know!

Anyway, I loved what getting a boom did for expanding my lighting capabilities, allowing me to exercise more of my creativity, and upping the production value of my shoots. Hopefully it'll do something similar for you!

Cheers!