Extra Battery Power

Hello everybody,
I had a shoot tonight, and it was a big and busy event in an hotel, with a dark reception room and a lot of flash power needed!

I found some collegues with nikon outfit, who carried a little extra battery pack attached to their flashes, and it seemed to provide an extra fast recharge time, and longer battery life.
this is what they used:

http://www.microglobe.co.uk/catalog/product_info.php?pName=nikon-sd800-sd800-ext...

I am now looking at possible similar products or DIY inventions to supply my pentax 360 with the same type of extra battery power.
I found that the bigger Pentax 540 has a £100 power pack that is connected via pc cable.

http://www.microglobe.co.uk/catalog/product_info.php?pName=pentax-tr-power-pack-...


I wonder if any of you have any experience in this, and can suggest any product or give some advice.

Thank you,
Cheers,

Nathan

I considered those for Wedding use, also quantim battery paks.
the cost was close to that of a second flash unit.
a second flash unit is more versitile.

since I have about five flash units (some bought for as little as $20.00 used) available, it just makes more sense to me to keep them all ready with a set of rechargable batteries and have a charger in my vehicle, or at the location (my newest solution is working great for me...so far... see power play thread).

so when one unit starts to die, grab another flash unit (if I'm really busy, when I'm not, get the dead batteries on the charger).

"big busy events" need pro gear and that for me would mean mains power, if appropriate, or separate battery packs. Don's solution is equally valid although if I was to go down that road I'd ideally like the flashguns all to be the same model

I got two viv 283's and an ftz500, and a 360fgz unit plus a ringflash.
there's always one set of batteries in my hip pak, and one on the charger. I've never run out of power mid shoot! and seldom have I had to grab the vivitars, but it's nice to know they're there!

Funny, I've been checking View New Posts all morning but didn't see this one until just now. I would not have started my thread about the TR3 pack if had seen this one. Odd timing.

I also had seen other brand names apparently firing away every second or two. Do they really recycle full power that quickly or do they just work better on lower power giving the ability to fire more quickly?

Just depends on the amount of power used / ISO settings I suppose.

Tried a quick experiment with my Metz 58, in our normally lit living room, just held the trigger down to see how many shots would fire with flash on continuous. Regularly got 9 shots sometimes 10 before the flash would recharge.

Having gone out shooting with the press occassionally, they all seem to have quantum battery packs for faster recharge when using flash, and they were firing at 9-10 frames a second as opposed to my 3fps!

Wow, sure beats the one per six seconds of the Pentax flash!!
Was that at full power? Of course I dunno if I could get that many at 1/16 power.
Pentax must have really skimped on the capacitors on the 360 and 540.
For the cost, I'm rather disappointed.

Not full power I presume, as it was on auto in a normally lit room.

On 1/16 power (tip I got from a press photographer for fill in flash) would still run 8-9 shots quite easily on continuous @ 3fps.

By the sounds of it then, I made a good choice going for the Metz over the Pentax 540? Possibly, but it has just developed a zoom error fault, so it's back to SRS to get it swapped next week!

The AF540 can cope with fast shooting... as long as you don't need the whole whack.

But then any flash (even my hulking great Metz 50MZ) will take an age to recharge if you discharge the whole thing. Some flash external packs provide high voltage input (think the Metz do) so you can have near instantaneous recharge. But, boy, the kit is flipping heavy!

I've done a few events with the AF540 and it's been just perfect (With the AF360 on wireless for fill in).

If the event requires a lot of light, then you may be better off with an AF540 on the camera, and one or two AF360's on wireless providing room lighting Failing that, an Elinchrom kit would be better still. Just a thought...

Matt

Oh, don't even mention Elinchrom's name. Im done with them.

Anyway, I'll try been playing with the 540 on lower power. Don't know if I'll be able to hold the 360 at the same time. I will unfortunately be wandering around outdoors through small crowds. So I am sort of limited.
But tat may also mean limited distance to subject and the lower power may be OK.

Does it sound right to say that HiSpeedSync will only work well in under a meter even at 1/800s? I know it gets knocked down a lot due to multiple flashes, but that seems rather short. Just been watching too much Strobist where they seem to be using strobes knocking down the sunlight with high shutter speed.
Hmmm... I suppose if I were able to get 1/250s or more I wouldn't need as much flash power??

Anyway, using your trick to keep the flash in Auto or Manual mode, I seem to be able to set up a decent exposure and still get several shots in a row.
I did similar work last year with no flash, but a little fill would be nice.
I haven't work with the flashes outdoors much (well, only where I could retake the photo if it were a junker -- that won't be much of an option now), so I'll need some practice.