Studio Flash Kit and radio trigger tips wanted

Hello all,
I've been a "natural light" landscape photographer all my life but now, with a possibility of product table top and portrait photography assignments coming my way, I'm thinking about acquiring a studio strobe kit. I have a 40m2 room available so, in your experience, what brand/power would you suggest for a good relation quality/cost up to 1500 Euros?
Also, as I'll be a beginner in studio lighting, does any radio trigger works with my K-5 and K10D or must I use a Pentax dedicated one?

Thanks a lot for your help.

Carlos

I use studio strobes, elinchrom and they are perfect for my needs, but... maybe you need to check out something like strobist.com first before deciding what you need? you might even get away with constant light sources..

Thank you, Don. I'll check strobist.com.
I'm more into a flash kit rather than constant light for a few reasons: I prefer to spend a little more now than having to pay a huge electricity bill every month, due to the large amount of time the lights would be on, for me to set still live compositions, let alone the heat produced by them. Also, I could use in the future the ability to freeze motion in portrait/fashion shoots, and that's hard to achieve with constant light.

I use hotshoe-flash-guns (YN560 & Viv285hv) and radio triggers (Cactus V4's)...

Portability is a big issue for me... I'd love a couple of elinchrom's or similar but I haven't the (regular) space to get the use from them and hotshoe flashes are simply more portable...
The fact they run on AA's is something I also find useful...

Strobist is a good first port of call...

As far as triggers on Pentax... Cactus V5's (from Gadget Infinity) are hard to beat...

My top tip is velcro...

I use a portable kit made up of 2 x light stands from 7dayshop.com, 2 x shoot-through umbrellas that also have silver lined covers for reflecting light, 3 x Seculine Twinlink Radio receivers, 2 x AF540FGZ flashes, and 2 x AF500FTZ flashes.

It cost a lot less than studio strobes and it's easily portable for use outside.

If you go the route of studio kit with softboxes, air damped stands, monobloc heads, modifiers (snoot, honeycomb, barn doors etc.), backgrounds etc., you could easily use up all of your budget I think.

Thank you Dave. The Cactus V5 is a great tip (seen a review on Youtube).
I have the AF-540 FGZ Flash but I'm not going that way because I could use the modeling light in the studio heads for composing still live.

Peter, thank you for your input. I don't care, for now, about light modifiers or backgrounds, just a straight simple kit of 2 or 3 flash heads and standard softboxes and respective stands. My question is what power. For instance, lets say I'll have 2 x 500w... besides tabletop productions, would it be enough to lit up a couple of fashion models, full body?

Others are more qualified than I am to reply to your question, so I'll leave it to them.

I have found this kit. Whether it's overkill for your purposes I don't know, but it reminded me that you will need a flash meter if you don't already own one.

These Elinchrom heads have a built-in EL-Skyport (radio trigger receiver). The kit also comes with a transmitter so you won't need to buy any radio triggering gear.

One important thing often overlooked is whether or not the flash tubes are user replaceable. These are.

Adding a third head, stand, softbox etc will just about use up your budget but you'll have a lighting system that should last a lifetime, barring accidents and failures of course.

Thank you very much Peter. That kit is a very good option. Guide number 90 is good. And flash duration of 1/1558 is just about enough to freeze motion. I guess for now I don't need to freeze a bullet...

http://www.elinchrom.com/product/Ranger-Quadra-RX.html

Oooooo, they're nice, if a bit pricey.

Balancing budget and reliability

http://www.lencarta.com/

Maybe not for now, but if you think you might need to freeze fast action in the future you'll need to carefully consider which system you invest in now. 1/1558th/sec is not so fast really and I doubt you'll want to fork out a similar amount of money later.

For a one off project in the future, renting is of course an option.

I guess the sensible decision would be to buy a kit that suits 80%+ of your currently perceived needs and worry about the other 20% when the opportunities arise.

This is similar to what I use: link

This will easily do what you want and more, remember that guide numbers don't usefully apply to studio flash since the output is varied enormously by the types of reflector and other modifier in use. In my opinion studio heads are much easier to use than hot shoe flashes.

Thanks for your suggestion, Alan. Never heard about that brand. While at first glance they seem good and affordable, I couldn't easily find technical support and spare parts around the corner here in Portugal.


Thank you Peter. Wise advice, yes. My main reason for acquiring a studio system is for product and still live and eventually some fashion or portraits. 1/1558th/sec will be enough to stop any natural human movement. Power wise, for what I expect to do with the kit, I hope 2x500w is right. I want to be able to use wide apertures to minimize DOF in still life and I'm afraid that with more than 500w I couldn't do it, unless I hag the lights way far from the subject... And even with 500w I'm not so sure about it!... Well, I'll just have to research more. :/
Any advice on this is much welcome,



Thank you for your input, Ken. For now I'm leaning towards Elinchrome. The built-in radio receivers and cooling fan as well as shops near my area, are great advantages.

500 watt/second is pretty powerful, using mine on half power gives around f8 for portraits, you can of course turn them down a good deal more or move them further away