Finally got my heavy-duty lighting boom and stand

Skip - that looks pretty similar to mine - some differences in the mount from the stand to the boom fitting but that's about the major difference. Oh, my boom is telescopic, not separate sections.

Um - my castors sometimes 'move' off-centre and the whole lot takes on a very unbalanced attitude. I re-position them and am now aware of their dereliction to duty so I watch them - one of these days I may just drive a pin through the fitting and that will stop them twisting on the legs.

Thanks, Les, for the tip on the extra weight at the bottom. I have some old (ancient - original lead type) diving weights around here so may press them into service.

Have fun, Skip - remember, they are not only for getting the light up high. My normal stands don't go down too low so I often use the boom to slide a light along at just above floor level, angled upwards. It's a very versatile tool.

Speaking of tools, have you tried angling the head with softbox on any unusual angles and noticed any slippage without that flat on the spigot? If it's working fine, great. If not, a couple of minutes in the workshop will fix that problem for good.

::John:: wrote in post #3718444
Have fun, Skip - remember, they are not only for getting the light up high. My normal stands don't go down too low so I often use the boom to slide a light along at just above floor level, angled upwards. It's a very versatile tool.

I have definitely thought about the low-view angle. That would be superb for some industrial photography I have thought of getting into or even shooting some of the displays in our local musuem.

::John:: wrote in post #3718444
Speaking of tools, have you tried angling the head with softbox on any unusual angles and noticed any slippage without that flat on the spigot? If it's working fine, great. If not, a couple of minutes in the workshop will fix that problem for good.

I have rotated the boom some 45 degrees and the light with the medium softbox mounted did not slip. I did buy a second spigot with the rig and intend to put flats on that and keep it handy in my box of accessories.

SkipD wrote in post #3718479
I have definitely thought about the low-view angle. That would be superb for some industrial photography I have thought of getting into or even shooting some of the displays in our local musuem.

Yeah - I had a product shoot the other day of a space-age looking bar-stool that was too high to fit in my light tent so I shot it in the studio with a small soft box leaking some light up from floor level and a hair light from above. Definitely a good use for the boom.

SkipD wrote in post #3718479
I have rotated the boom some 45 degrees and the light with the medium softbox mounted did not slip. I did buy a second spigot with the rig and intend to put flats on that and keep it handy in my box of accessories.

Hmmm - agreed. My small soft box has little effect but the large one is 27"x54" (I just measured it - in inches - we use metric here) is quite a weight to hang out on the end of the boom.

Good idea to have that included in the accessories box, too. I like these 'chats' they give me more ideas (and more ways to spend cash )

Great looking piece of equipment - I want one! It just looks so easy to use and should provide light where you want it...

We've got an outdoor shoot coming up and I've been mulling the idea of sandbags for our light stands. I realized I have two sets of sand bag bags, 8 in all, from our deck canopy (we screw the canopy to our deck). I think I'll dig them out and see what I can come up with. I like the lead weights too...

I like the weights for in the studio but if I were working on location I think I would want either the ones you fill with sand or water that can be emptied at the end of the shoot to make carrying the gear out and home much easier.

TMR Design wrote in post #3719510
I like the weights for in the studio but if I were working on location I think I would want either the ones you fill with sand or water that can be emptied at the end of the shoot to make carrying the gear out and home much easier.

I like the idea of water balloons. They could be used for some fun after a shoot!

Seriously - gallon water jugs that you carry empty and have a way to fasten them to the bottom of the stands make a lot of sense. That's about 8.3 pounds per jug. Three per stand would be ideal for something that's at risk of falling over (particularly outdoors).

SkipD wrote in post #3719531
I like the idea of water balloons. They could be used for some fun after a shoot!

Seriously - gallon water jugs that you carry empty and have a way to fasten them to the bottom of the stands make a lot of sense. That's about 8.3 pounds per jug. Three per stand would be ideal for something that's at risk of falling over (particularly outdoors).

Yup! I didn't even think of it until one day I was browsing B&H for sandbags and came across the ones you can fill with water. Sounded like a great idea.

If you know you're going to the beach for a shoot then why not take advantage of what makes up most of the beach.....sand

But I would never want sand or water in my studio so the dead weights make sense for that.

Skip, how tall is that ceiling in your basement? It doesn't look like a standard low basement ceiling.

TMR Design wrote in post #3719574
Skip, how tall is that ceiling in your basement? It doesn't look like a standard low basement ceiling.

Unfortunately, it's only 7'6". That works for tabletop photography but not a lot else.

I plan on using the garage (9"+ to the rafters) if I need to do anything with people in the shot and in front of a portable background. Most likely I will do that sort of thing at other venues, though.

I guess I was fooled by the angle and field of view. It looked like you had 8+ feet.

I'm still working on figuring out the best way to have an overhead hair light in a soft box. It would work fine all the way up for a sitting portrait but as soon as my subject stands it becomes too tight and too close.

So as much as I want the boom I'm trying to find the best modifier to use for my hair light. I do like bringing it in from the side with a grid or barn doors but I can't get that very smooth transition from main light to hairlight to create a nice soft lighting across the top of the head and off to the shadow side. I have taken my barn doors, placed diffusion material over the front and placed it up at the ceiling to simulate the mini soft box and it works very nicely but has to be 12 to 14" from the ceiling and a small softbox would distance it even further from the ceiling. I'm wondering if one of the very small softboxes would work or if I should just build a softbox to my own specifications. I can get back about 2" by using a right angle power cord too.

If you have a local sporting goods store which stocks shotgun reloading stuff just buy a couple of bags of shot (I would suggest the newer steal shot). It used to come in heavy canvas bags and made for wonderful heavy sand bags.

Just checked online and found this web sight which lists shot

http://www.midwayusa.c​om …**11462***9502*​**19963***

Wayne

Hi Wayne,

That's a pretty expensive solution.

TMR Design wrote in post #3719868
I guess I was fooled by the angle and field of view. It looked like you had 8+ feet.

Robert, if I were to put the third piece into the boom, it would be approximately nine feet long. Of that, seven feet can be on the light's side of the stand and support somewhere around ten pounds according to the specs (which I don't have on this computer while I am at a customer's site). That would not be totally balanced by the counterweight, but it would be within the specs.

There's nothing like quality, especially when it comes to light stands.

That's one reason I recommend not buying a lighting "kit."

I bought the Hensel Monolight Kit complete with stands, wheeled case, etc.

While the stands are servicable, they're not as heavy duty as I'd like. If I had to do it over again, I'd buy everything separately and not skimp on stands.

Nice, Skip.
mark

Hey Skip,

Can you describe and perhaps show an image of the wheels, how they mount, and quality?

How do they tighten to the tripod legs and do they attach in a way that keeps them in place instead of rotating to the sides as weight is placed on the stand?

TMR Design wrote in post #3761718
Hey Skip,

Can you describe and perhaps show an image of the wheels, how they mount, and quality?

How do they tighten to the tripod legs and do they attach in a way that keeps them in place instead of rotating to the sides as weight is placed on the stand?

I'll see if I can find time to take a photo of the wheels and one with the parts disassembled.

However - if you've ever seen any of the Manfrotto stands with wheels you might have recognized that there is a (steel?) block with a male projection that locates on a hole in the stand's leg. This stand has a similar, though much larger, block like that which is between a setscrew in the wheel mount and the leg itself.

The casters for my smaller Manfrotto stands are like a ball with the "tire" positioned at 45° - much like the casters on a lot of office chairs. These casters, though, are MUCH heavier duty and are built like standard wheels. They stay in place quite well when you load the stand, and on a hard surface they roll very easily. In fact, I am thinking about making or buying something to use to lock the wheels, as they don't have a locking mechanism. That would be a good addition.