Big Lights On Location

Most of us here at GORP use small speedlights extensively.  We’re big fans of David Hobby, and his blog at strobist.com.  We use speedlights for many different situations.  They’re invaluable when you need to travel light, and used correctly, can provide excellent results, but there are times when they just aren’t enough.  For example, when your trying to beat the sun with your flash on a sunny Mexican beach.  Unless you’ve got a camera with a VERY high native sync speed or FP Sync (Focal plane high-speed sync), and the triggering system to accommodate FP Sync,  you’re going to be firing your speedlights at high power very close to your subject.   Your recycle times are going to be long, and your speedlights just might not have the power you need.   Since shooting on the beaches and locations of Rocky Point, a lot of us have taken to bringing portable but bigger lights.  If you’d like to read more about using big lights on location, check out this post on Don Giannitti’s Lighting Essentials site.  Don’s got written an excellent post about 2 of our photographers on location with their big lights.  And don’t forget, if you’re considering taking one of Don’s workshops, this year his Mexico workshop will be held at the same time as our primary calendar photography in April, and all students will be given the opportunity to assist on the calendar, and do some shooting of their own.  So check out his Mexico workshop page here, and then sign up for it at the Las Palmas Resort site here.