I have read it is only good like that if you leave it up permanently? This isn't an option as I live in a small town house so I need to be able to put it away. I worked with a photographer who had a cotton muslin background and went nuts everytime he used it.

Thanks for the reply. I do have a stand and umbrella set for the jessops flash. It is one of those tilt and swivel ones, I don't know the model number because I cba to get off my backside and look ha.
I wanted the vinyl because it is going to be in my small front room that is carpeted and thought paper would not be good on a soft floor. Plus I can wipe it clean. I found a 2.9m by 6m vinyl background for £65 delivered with a heavy duty support for £40.
When it comes I will mess about with it a lot. I don't like to use my flash too much though because I worry about the lifespan that Lastolite agent told me about on the phone!
Ha yes, I am up in Allerton! Nice to see another Pentax user in Bradford, I am tired of seeing bloody canon 5D's!

Hello, I am new to studio photography and I am about to purchase a vinyl background in white. I am choosing vinyl because the creases in cotton muslin would drive me nuts.

I wondered if someone could tell me about paper backgrounds? Is vinyl a better option?
Could someone also help me with my lighting set up? I have 2 x 400w Lastolites and 1 x Jessops hot shoe flash. Would the Jessops flash be enough to light up the background if it was on full power?

I am selling -

Samsung GX-20 - Almost perfect condition apart little mark near the S on the front that isn't noticable.
Genuine Grip - Perfect condition.
Genuine Battery - As above.
Genuine Charger - As above.
Extra battery - As above.
Stock 18-55 - Perfect condition hardly used.
Stock 50-200 - As above.

Open to offers, Need to fund a K-5 purchase.

Wow I didn't expect to get this many replies.

It is interesting about the voltage, I have definitely resigned that flash now, even though I have been using it on and off all day! Something that made a difference was removing my grip. It seemed to work after that, so I thought it might be because I had the camera set to use the grip battery first, but with the grip back on and camera set to use the camera battery first, it still wouldn't work. I have never heard anything about voltages before when it comes to flash and I will be going back to Bradford Camera Exchange and asking why they gave me duff advice. I do have a wireless trigger system and one of the receivers has an X-Sync port on, so would it be useful to try using that? They're cheapish, £50, so I am not sure if the voltage issue will burn them up?

Is it safe to use my studio flash via the X-Sync port? They're Lastolites and I have only had them a year.

I do have a Jessops flash gun, which it itself is dodgy and temperamental, although on just testing now, it seemed to be working off TTL, something it rarely does. I really cannot afford another flash gun, since I rarely use them at weddings (this next one is at the registry office that is dark and dingy). I am a low budget wedding photographer (I prefer to be up on a hill somewhere shooting landscapes) so even one wedding wont pay for a new flash. Plus I have just spent all of my savings on a new motorbike, I will be eating pasta for the next two weeks because I cant even afford food!

Once again, thanks for the replies!

Helloooo,

I have a problem I need some help with. It is a little bit complicated so I will try my best to describe the issue.

I have a Samsung GX-20 (apparently it is effectively a K20D) and I use a bracket flash with it, Hanimex 550 to be exact. I connect it to my camera with the X-Sync cable. All of a sudden it will not fire, infact it will fire randomly a couple of times but then wont at all.

The bracket flash fires from a film camera every time without fail.
I thought it would be my X-Sync port so I tried my home studio flash from it and it fired fine multiple times.

So I thought it could be my settings, I have tried it in Manual and X mode on the camera but neither seems to make a difference. On Manual I am on 125/9.5 and have tried it on 90/8 60/4.5 and quite a few others to no avail. On X I am stuck to 180.

The batteries are fully charged and the flash will fire if I press the test button.

I have a wedding in 20 days and I am actually shitting myself now because the hot shoe flash I have is very unreliable.

Hope someone can help,

Chris.

Ah I wish I lived in London just so I could go ask! Every camera shop I have asked up here in the North, have shrugged their shoulders as if I am speaking a foreign language. Bloody useless they are!
Am I right in thinking there's a CPL that will fit in the step down/up ring? I have been researching all day whilst at work, much to the annoyance of my boss, and I just cannot fathom all the bloody choices. Someone said to me "why not just use it at 12mm and stick with what you have?" but my answer was pretty straightforward... "..if I wanted 12mm I would've bought a 12mm lens!"

Hiya Carl,
Ta for the reply.
sorry about the post, I wasn't clear. I do have a wide angle P holder and it has just one slot. I also have a slim screw in CPL. When I put these two together I get vignetting in the corners. I thought the Hitech was different since they do filters that are 100mm, not 85mm like the cokin P. I was wondering if the Hitech filter holder for the 100mm filters could be used with a slim screw on CPL without vignetting at 10mm.

Cheers

I have a Samsung GX-20D, effectively a K20D but in a different body. My question doesn't relate to the camera itself, but the options for filter setups and opinion gathering.

The problem;
I have the k mount Tamron 10 - 24 lens and I love it. I rarely have it off my camera and love shooting landscape with it. I use the cokin p wide angle adapter at the moment which is limited. I like to use a CPL and of course, I get vignetting from 10 - 12mm when both are used together.

I am wanting to upgrade, but I would like to know if anyone has experience of using a slim 77mm CPL with a hitech filter holder. I assume I can use a Lee filter in the hitech filter holder as long as they're the same width (which I think they are, 100mm?) and is there any vignetting whilst using a slim CPL between the lens and the filter holder?
I really cannot decide/work out which system I need because there's various step up rings, rings, and the modular filters. Buying a Lee CPL is not an option right now at £150ish!

I hope someone can help.

Thanks

Hi, I am not sure if I can ask this question here but I am having trouble with photomatix 3.2.9. All of a sudden when I choose process the final processed image is coming out nothing like I had it in tonemapping.

Has anyone else had this problem and found a fix? I am going to try going back to 3.0.

Tone Mapping

Process

Since tried it on version 3.0 and I have the same issue.