Genesis 200 spontaneously flashing

Almost every time I go to one of the 200's to adjust one of the buttons, the flash fires. It happens a moment after I finish pressing whichever button. It's annoying and wasteful. Is this a flaw in the flash unit, or is it normal?

Stefan

mine does the same thing, and I think it's normal.

i think it's to clear the memory of your last setting.

The only time mine does it is when I lower the power level, and the flash "dumps" the excess energy. Otherwise, I don't get any random fires.

I have the same lights. What I assume you're talking about is adjusting the power setting. If the power setting is 45 and you want to take it down to 35, the light has already charged itself to 45. It needs to discharge that power and reset itself to the lesser setting. That's the only time it should be happening. And yes, obnoxious, but necessary. Just close your eyes or look away when your done reducing power.

ABs don't do this.

bobbyz wrote in post #6889143
ABs don't do this.

From what I read somewhere, ABs don't do this but the first shot after adjusting down the power, you will still get the same power level as the previous setting (i.e. from 3/4 to 1/4, the first shot will still give 3/4 and succeeding shots will then be set to 1/4). I think I wouldn't want that since I would get an overexposed shot every time I lower my power setting.

Basically, with the AB, you need to "dump" the extra power manually everytime you lower down the power and the Genesis does it automatically by dumping through a flash.

545iBMW wrote in post #6889361
From what I read somewhere, ABs don't do this but the first shot after adjusting down the power, you will still get the same power level as the previous setting (i.e. from 3/4 to 1/4, the first shot will still give 3/4 and succeeding shots will then be set to 1/4). I think I wouldn't want that since I would get an overexposed shot every time I lower my power setting.

Basically, with the AB, you need to "dump" the extra power manually everytime you lower down the power and the Genesis does it automatically by dumping through a flash.

That is not accurate. After reducing the power on my AB's the "dump" light comes on as the extra energy is discharged internally. This happens without firing the flash tube and the next shot will be at whatever power setting you have changed it to.

jdpence wrote in post #6889534
That is not accurate. After reducing the power on my AB's the "dump" light comes on as the extra energy is discharged internally. This happens without firing the flash tube and the next shot will be at whatever power setting you have changed it to.

Well, I'm just sharing what I read.
I will try that with my ABR800 and measure with a light meter.

Stefan A wrote in post #6889027
Almost every time I go to one of the 200's to adjust one of the buttons, the flash fires. It happens a moment after I finish pressing whichever button. It's annoying and wasteful. Is this a flaw in the flash unit, or is it normal?

Stefan

If it happens when you are lowering the output power it is perfectly normal, it is a function called "auto dump" which means the monolight is dumping the excess of power it so the monolight is ready to shoot at the power output you selected.

Thanks everyone. I will go home and make sure it only happens when lowering power. I hadn't noticed that.

Stefan

jdpence wrote in post #6889534
That is not accurate. After reducing the power on my AB's the "dump" light comes on as the extra energy is discharged internally. This happens without firing the flash tube and the next shot will be at whatever power setting you have changed it to.

545iBMW wrote in post #6889560
Well, I'm just sharing what I read.
I will try that with my ABR800 and measure with a light meter.

The ABs do have a auto dump feature which allows the strobe to discharge to the required level without the need to fire off the strobe. However, if you can't wait the second or two for the excess energy to be discharged automatically, you can fire the strobe yourself to dump it and then wait a second or two for it to recharge.

The head was just trying to dump excess power when you decrease the power. If you adjust your power up, I don't believe this will happen. This is a bit annoying, but I'd take that over re-metering after every adjustment anyday.

viet wrote in post #6890708
The head was just trying to dump excess power when you decrease the power. If you adjust your power up, I don't believe this will happen. This is a bit annoying, but I'd take that over re-metering after every adjustment anyday.

I'm not sure I understand. You would have to meter anyway after every adjustment, no? Or do you just adjust the camera setting by the same Ev amount you adjusted the light setting?

PacAce wrote in post #6892123
I'm not sure I understand. You would have to meter anyway after every adjustment, no? Or do you just adjust the camera setting by the same Ev amount you adjusted the light setting?

What I meant was that Genesis is very consistent in its power adjustment, and it really helps with the digital dial instead of analog.

For instance, tonight while shooting my kid, I metered the first time, and I needed to bring its power down half a stop, I dialed down half a knot & it gave out exactly what I asked so I didn't need to re-measure, while with some other cheaper alternatives (with analog controls come to mind), you don't really know exactly how much you'd get stopping down (or up) no matter how steady you control it so you have to re-measure every time.