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Options: Pack & Head Systems

there are always different types of location lighting solutions coming to the market and things are constantly changing whether it's model blocks or packing head systems or speed lights but right now I would like to go through kind of the main brands the main options available on the market now trust me I am not by any means covering every different option that's out there but instead the ones that are either most commonly used or the ones that I have experience with so if you don't have a location lighting solution take a look at these analyzed your needs and see which one fits best for you here we have bronn colors move pack and this is bronn colors premier location lighting solution now let's take a look at the specs on this system this is a head and pack system now the pack itself weighs thirteen point seven pounds and the head is three point seven pounds now a benefit for photographers shooting a lot of commercial things is that if you already own broad color lighting all of the b...

ronze color modifiers or going to work on this head system this pack is twelve hundred watt seconds and has nine stops of variable power at tense of a stop so what that means in practicality is that twelve hundred watt seconds you khun you know completely illuminate a scene if you needed to you can overpower the sun but with that nine stops of variable power you can also turn the power way way down to just add a kiss of light to the scene or allow you to shoot that really really wide apertures this kit has extremely good recycle time so if you're photographing ah lot of stroke aske opic situations or you want to be able to shoot many frames in a row at full power it's still less than one second recycle time with this battery you have two hundred and thirty full power flashes and of course you can also purchase additional batteries that you can swap right into this pack let's talk about a couple of the benefits of this particular pack this head right here is the moby led light so it actually is an led modeling light as well as a strobe and the led modeling like is daylight balance so using this pack you actually have two full hours of using this led light so you can go ahead and add on the brown color modifiers and actually shoot video or use continuous light with this set up another benefit another reason why a lot of photographers might choose a solution is the fact that the flash duration actually on the pack itself I convey ari the length of the flash duration which is great if and photographing a lot of movement or trying to freeze particles in the air this pack is extremely consistent color and also has two power outlets so I can plug in two heads at once and I can change the power at one tenth stop increments the downside and really the big downside for this pack of course would be the price and also the weight being thirteen point seven pounds for the pack alone it is a little bit on the heavier end of location lighting but still pretty manageable looking at the different capabilities here on the pack I can change this to b radio triggered and brown color actually has its own trigger that you can use and you can also make it an optical slave I can change the power output of each head so that they could be symmetrical or asymmetrical meaning I could make it so that they have the same power output or each different head aiken very two tenths of a stop I can also change the master power output here and so as you can see changing the head power at tense of a stop I can also turn the modeling light off if I want to save power which of course you want to do if you want to have the optimum battery life when you're going out on location on the other side of the pack you have this lcd display which gives you a lot of the more advanced options which is why people go with brown color or this particular pack in the first place if we take a look at the menu ah couple of the things I can vary is I can change the modeling light so that its either constant or I can have it come on briefly for a few seconds and then turn off to save battery power can also change the sequencing so if I want the strobe to fire ten times in a row I can change that here on pack which is really great for strobe aske opic effects and also photographing a lot of movement the next option that I have is flash duration so if I know that I'm photographing movement or I'm photographing particles in the air I can choose to have these shortest fast oration possible with this particular pack and I can set it right here in this lcd display a couple other options we also have built into this pack is ico which means that I won't have this fast of recycled times but it will make sure that my battery lasts longer and then also speed I can quickly turn on in order to give me faster flash durations if I'm going to be shooting the type of photography that requires it photographers that might consider this particular pack and head system would be those needing really fast flash durations or need really fast recycle times and want a lot of power output in this case twelve hundred watt seconds when they're going out on location this is going to be for the pro or higher and photographer here we have the pro photo q b two six hundred so this is a six hundred watt second pack and head solution you have seven stops of variable power output very fast recycle times between point zero nine seconds and two point five seconds and you get about two hundred full power flashes per battery now the benefits of this system are that you are using pro photo modifier so that if you're already shooting pro photo in your studio you can use the same modifiers in this set up what's nice is that it has a relatively small footprint the pack itself including the battery weighs seven point nine pounds and the head is three point two pounds so it gives you a very lightweight solution for this head which makes it easier to boom out over a scene or put in unusual locations another benefit of this set up is that I can use the pro photo air remotes these air used to trigger to fire this system and therefore I wouldn't need to buy her another triggering setup for example like a pocket wizard also the seven stop range allows me to shoot at six hundred watt seconds so I can illuminate an entire scene and then also I can turn the power off way down to just put a kiss of light into the sand if I so choose there are a couple downsides to the set up first of all the price is a bit of a downside and also this particular pack on ly allows one power outlet so I can only use one head at additional cost you can actually buy another cable which will plug into the same outlet but split so that you can illuminate to strobe heads at once on the left hand side of the power pack I can change the overall output of the pack two full power quarter power and half power but then in the center dial I can change the output intense of a stop simply by turning the dial I can also use a modeling light if I turned the modeling light to battery it'll actually use energy from the battery I have in the pack however I have the ability to plug in an external power source here and have that solely power the modeling lights so as to not decrease the number of full power flashes per battery here you can see where I can change the channel of this particular pack and therefore I can use my a remote to fire the strobe also it's very simple to remove the battery it also makes a foolproof saying this side up and replace the battery the head for this particular pack system that we're using here uses an incandescent ball which means it devours a lot more energy than an led modeling light wood so if I want to use the modeling like I can simply push this dial to battery and it starts to drain the battery in order to illuminate the incandescent bulb however if I don't want to do that because I don't want to decrease the number of full power flash outputs from this battery I can switch the dial to external and I can plug in an external battery source here so that it won't be draining the battery this location lighting setup is great for photographers that air photographing already using pro photo modifiers so that it's easy to transfer them to this particular set up also someone looking for a medium range of power output around so it's six hundred watts and also a relatively light pak solution there are several very high end location lighting solutions for the photographer that has a few more demands for the type of work that they're producing maybe you need really really fast recycle times extremely fast flashed rations and really accurate color and a great deal of what second output well in that instance you would want the pro photo probie for this particular set up is a pack and head set up that outputs a thousand watt seconds of power and it has eleven stops variability so I can completely illuminate the scene or just have a little bit of light added to the scene now a downside or one of the elements of this is that it has it weighs twenty one point six pounds so it is going to be much heavier solution however if you definitely need that power output and all those other features perhaps this would be an option of the direction you want to go you get two hundred twenty full power flashes per battery and again you can use a pro photo air remote so the pros for this system is that it's going to fill a lot of the means but maybe a higher and she would require like fast recycling time a lot of power out plate very fast flash duration and of course you can use pro photo modifiers which are readily available from pretty much any rental house in the world another benefit is that it has to head outlets that you're not just limited to one head or one strobe when using this pack system the downsides are the weight and the price with having a lot more of these options for hire and commercial shoots of course the price is going to increase the pro photo probies four solution is going to be one of the highest end location lighting solutions because of all of the different capabilities it provides a professional photographer here we have the ellen from ranger quadra and this is a pack and head system and one of the biggest attractions of this system is that it is quite portable and in fact these heads with almost nothing the head weighs just over a half a pound it's almost nothing so if you need to have this boomed out over a scene or you need a lot of maneuverability this is going to be a great option for you the pack here produces four hundred watt seconds and it weighs six point six pounds for including the battery the recycle time varies between about a half a second and two point two seconds and using one battery you get one hundred and fifty full power flashes another benefit of this particular system is that you can use to heads at once now the downside is that you can't have these symmetrical or even in power but instead there's a two to one ratio some of the features available on this particular pack is that you can increase and decrease the power intense of a stop and also the heads use led modeling lights and because they're led they don't eat oppa's much battery as an incandescent light and therefore there you can use them or to shape your light where you can even shoot by these lights the ellen chrome ranger quadra can be triggered by the standard pocket wizard but also ellen crumb has their own proprietary sky port trigger which is going to allow you to change the power output from this trigger another benefit of this particular head and pack system is that many photographers will actually put the light on a stand and use this relatively compact pack as a sandbag toe wait down the stand one downside of this pack and head system is that it has relatively low power output at four hundred watt seconds yet for many photographers that might be more than sufficient for the type of work they're producing here we have the hence a ll port e twelve hundred this is a pack and head system that is twelve hundred watt second output with seven stops of variable power now some of the benefits of this particular system are that it has such a strong power output at twelve hundred watt seconds and of course you can turn it down as low as you need within that seven stop range another thing that is very attractive to photographers is that although this is a portable power system in the front the battery can actually be removed and be replaced with a c module which means when you take out the battery to charge you can actually replace something that allows you to plug this pack into the wall so now it makes it both a studio solution and a location battery pack solution so you have both within one so for many photographers this is helping achieve both of these needs another benefit is that it does have two outlets so you can power to strobes at the same time and you can adjust the power output by one tenth of a stop increments the recycle time is point two to two point one seconds and you get two hundred ten full power flashes from each battery charge one of the main downsides however is indeed the weight now the pack itself is thirteen point five pounds and the head is another six point seven pounds so together is going to be pretty heavy portable lighting solution and for photographers where that makes a big difference you might opt for something a little bit lighter so look at this the main benefits of this particular solution are the fact that it can be used both as a studio solution and as a location lighting solution has two outlets has a lot of variability of power a lot of power output but it is quite pricey and it is quite heavy so this is going to be a solution for photographers who perhaps already like and use hansel products or for somebody who's looking for a solution that they can use both on location and in the studio let's take a look at some of the options on the pack itself I have the ability to just the power output by full stops or by tens of a stop another thing to look at is that this pack and power to heads at once and you also have the ability to modify the ratio is between the power output of both of these heads this pat can also be fired by a variety of different triggers including the pro photo air and also stroh wizard you can also plug into the sink in order to use a pocket wizard it's one of the main things that people would be attracted to using this pack and head system would be the fact that it provides both a studio and location solution one because you can change the a c module in the front and also the fact that it has a lot of power output twelve hundred watt seconds so if you're photographing big scenes or large groups this might be a fantastic option for you course one of the downsides is the price and the way it is one of the heavier location lighting options that we've discussed