For those of you still attached to this page via RSS the new link is up here: RSS
The link should have been automatically updated, and I'd imagine this page is now dead, but if you still manage to find it by accident, check for me in these places:
www.lebryk.com
facebook
twitter
Flickr
Thanks, and hope to see you soon!
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Sunday, January 23, 2011
New Home...
I just wanted to inform everyone via RSS (if it hasn't ported over, or you just periodically check via bookmark), that my blog has moved.
What? ZOMG! What does that mean!?
Simple, you should just simply check my blog on my website from now on. www.lebryk.com. Check it out. Portfolio, BLog, and all sorts of other little stuff available there.
My girlfriend/webGuru Shannon is working on Porting the RSS feeds directly, so that you don't need to do anything, but I don't think she has been successful yet. Either way, Fair warning that this blogspot page won't be updated much from here on out. I hope to see you all at the new diggs!
http://www.lebryk.com
http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/pages/Marc-Lebryk-Photography/214237967628
http://twitter.com/marclebryk
What? ZOMG! What does that mean!?
Simple, you should just simply check my blog on my website from now on. www.lebryk.com. Check it out. Portfolio, BLog, and all sorts of other little stuff available there.
My girlfriend/webGuru Shannon is working on Porting the RSS feeds directly, so that you don't need to do anything, but I don't think she has been successful yet. Either way, Fair warning that this blogspot page won't be updated much from here on out. I hope to see you all at the new diggs!
http://www.lebryk.com
http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/pages/Marc-Lebryk-Photography/214237967628
http://twitter.com/marclebryk
Sunday, January 16, 2011
Remembering Gabe...
My Uncle and Grandmother were with him when he passed, and that’s all I really know right now. Other than of course it’s the little things that’ll be missed. Examples being his methods of teaching my sister and I to share growing up by tearing some denomination of currency in half ($20 or $50 depending on what kind of mood he was in to watch us), and saying figure this out. More often than not I just gave my half of the bill to my sister because if she was willing to deal with the bank on the ripped up bill, she deserved my half. Never really knew what he thought of that solution, but it meant I didn't actually have to go to a bank which I was ok with. (I hope my accountant doesn't read this as he'll probably mention that turning down money is yet another reason for him to call my profession a Hobby.) Another classic moment of his were his one liner jokes which included things like, “A bear shits in the woods...” Followed only by laughter.
I’d like to say he was a master of technology as I not only have received emails from him, but while I was in college he was on the AOL Instant messenger train and would talk via the computer regularly. He was a firm believer that time wasn't to waste though and if he messaged me and I didn't respond within approximately 15 seconds he would assume I wasn't there and sign off. If there was one thing I could say about his computer usage though, it's that he was always Virus free by the method of installing every anti virus software he could find to the point that it took approximately 45 minutes for his Vista Laptop to boot. Despite that fact, he made sure that it was always off when he was done so that no viruses could get on there while he wasn’t closely watching it’s every move.
Another thing is that he was a big fan of his Minolta Film SLR that he used to this day. He however was not my inspiration into photography, my grandpa Ted was. Gabe however did enjoy the craft, and owned several cameras along the way including dozens $20 OpTikatechpixelmegafawangerawesome brand digital cameras and used them constantly to document life around him. Above all though he wanted a cat, but my grandmother wouldn’t have it. Every time he saw me he told me he was jealous that I had one, and it pains me that I was never able to introduce him to Cheeto in any form but via email.
Despite the things that I’ve said here seeming somewhat tongue in cheek, he was smarter than all of us. His Vista PC cost him $200 and if they had more than one on sale that day he’d have bought two; just in case. Sure beats the hell out of the Kidney Buttload of cash I paid for my Mac Pro, or Macbook Pro for that matter. It was all he needed to email and pay his bills. His $20 cameras couldn’t print anything poster sized, but they could print pictures of his grandkids for the refrigerator just fine. Unlike 90% of the consumer market he knew what he needed, and wasn’t going to get something he didn’t. Just like the bear in the woods, he knew that sometimes the little things in life were meant to be laughed at. Despite how random, or how asinine things may appear it’s funny how it’s all a matter of perspective. Last weekend I saw him in the hospital and when we walked in my grandmother asked him if he knew who I was to which is response was simply; “What are you, Stupid? Marc, sit down…” Feisty until the end. He will be missed. More Soon.
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
Dr. Sketchy's...
A few weeks ago my girlfriend Shannon asked me if I would go with her to Dr. Sketchy's anti-Art School at Birdy's Bar here in Indianapolis. If you aren't familiar with Dr. Sketchy's, it's a Burlesque show where the models take poses and everyone takes a few minutes to try to sketch them out. In my case, and in the case of a select few others they allowed us to photograph the event.
Not to say that I didn't sketch a few things out with Shannon as well as photograph the event, after all we went to spend some time together on top of doing an art related activity; but my sketches were so EPIC that I was asked not to post them here for fear that I would give the troop a bad image devalue the sketches.
There were a few other shooters there, Ryan Baxter whom I met at the Warehouse Photo workshop last year, as well as a guy named Don, whose business card I can't find at the moment but will try to remember to update with a last name later. It was a neat experience as I'd never actually seen a Burlesque show before, but the thing that really excited me was the fact that I was there under no deadlines, instructions, limitations (other than no flash) or any pressure to post the images anywhere. Very un-normal for me.
As it also turns out Shannon and my friend Nikki is joining the troop as well, so it looks like we'll be going back to see her perform. That night she was doing the job known as being the 'Stage Kitten', meaning she got to collect the things that the Burlesque Dancers dropped while they were on stage. Unfortunately due to different distractions, as well as a lack of spotlights while she was doing this I was unable to get a photo of her doing her job. Next time Nikki, Next time.
That's Violet Phoenix from the Bloomington Burlesque Brigade. She was the special guest/model for the evening and she really genuinely seemed to enjoy what she did. Holding poses for anywhere between 1 and 15 minutes at a time is tough! If you don't believe me, you should try it out and see for yourself. I digress, though. It was quite the event, and it definitely helped me out with working on shooting things just for myself as I wanted to do in 2011. It's not something I concepted out, or had any control of; but whether I took the photos or not didn't matter. I was doing it because I wanted to just like this guy here using crayola crayons to sketch miss Violet.
Last night I gave the opening class lecture for the Advanced Portrait class at the Art Institute of Indianapolis. One of the things that I pushed to them was that their personal work would get them more gigs shooting than anything they shoot with a big name attached. I'm not sure that my night shooting at Dr. Sketchy's really qualifies as 'personal' work for me as it was just kind of an event coverage, but the fact that I was there shooting just to shoot under no real pressure from anyone or anything is a good start. I even broke the ISO barrier in as I very rarely take my camera above 800 normally... Welcome to 2011. More Soon.
 |
| Nikon D3s, 2500ISO, Nikon 50mmF1.4G, 1/60th@F1.8 |
Not to say that I didn't sketch a few things out with Shannon as well as photograph the event, after all we went to spend some time together on top of doing an art related activity; but my sketches were so EPIC that I was asked not to post them here for fear that I would give the troop a bad image devalue the sketches.
There were a few other shooters there, Ryan Baxter whom I met at the Warehouse Photo workshop last year, as well as a guy named Don, whose business card I can't find at the moment but will try to remember to update with a last name later. It was a neat experience as I'd never actually seen a Burlesque show before, but the thing that really excited me was the fact that I was there under no deadlines, instructions, limitations (other than no flash) or any pressure to post the images anywhere. Very un-normal for me.
 |
| Nikon D3s, 2000ISO, Nikon 70-200F2.8VR2@185mm, 1/60th@F2.8 |
As it also turns out Shannon and my friend Nikki is joining the troop as well, so it looks like we'll be going back to see her perform. That night she was doing the job known as being the 'Stage Kitten', meaning she got to collect the things that the Burlesque Dancers dropped while they were on stage. Unfortunately due to different distractions, as well as a lack of spotlights while she was doing this I was unable to get a photo of her doing her job. Next time Nikki, Next time.
 |
| Nikon D3s, 4500ISO(EEK!), Nikon 70-200F2.8VR2@200mm, 1/60th@F2.8 |
That's Violet Phoenix from the Bloomington Burlesque Brigade. She was the special guest/model for the evening and she really genuinely seemed to enjoy what she did. Holding poses for anywhere between 1 and 15 minutes at a time is tough! If you don't believe me, you should try it out and see for yourself. I digress, though. It was quite the event, and it definitely helped me out with working on shooting things just for myself as I wanted to do in 2011. It's not something I concepted out, or had any control of; but whether I took the photos or not didn't matter. I was doing it because I wanted to just like this guy here using crayola crayons to sketch miss Violet.
 |
| Nikon D3s, 12,800ISO (hOly cOw!) Nikon 70-200F2.8VR@180mm, 1/60th@F2.8 |
Last night I gave the opening class lecture for the Advanced Portrait class at the Art Institute of Indianapolis. One of the things that I pushed to them was that their personal work would get them more gigs shooting than anything they shoot with a big name attached. I'm not sure that my night shooting at Dr. Sketchy's really qualifies as 'personal' work for me as it was just kind of an event coverage, but the fact that I was there shooting just to shoot under no real pressure from anyone or anything is a good start. I even broke the ISO barrier in as I very rarely take my camera above 800 normally... Welcome to 2011. More Soon.
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
Pocket Wizard Flex TT5/TT1 for Nikon Review...
If you're a Nikon shooter I know you've been jealous of the fact that the Canon shooters out there have had the Pocket Wizard Flex TT5 and TT1 now for a long time. Long time did I say? Almost two years in fact. Now while I knew for a fact that before going into the beta test of these devices I could do a lot of what I already do using my SU-800 Speedlight commander, the allure of a RF High Speed Shutter Sync at up to 1/8000th of a second at up to 1,000 feet? Yea, pretty awesome. But that's not all that I was concerned with when I was able to test these Nikon Flex Beta Units. I was not only worried about how they performed under extreme conditions, but I was worried about how they would perform in every day conditions as well.
First off I'd like to mention that I was not paid for this review, and am not going to say 100% positive things about these units, however I know that the units that I tested were in the beta stages and most of the very few problems that I encountered have been solved in the final hardware that is shipping over seas even while I write this. So for you tech nerds out there, are you ready for the nitty gritty? Hope so, because there's a lot of it. For you photo nerds out there, I hope the pictures are just as interesting...
Anyone who shoots with Nikons CLS system knows how hard it can be to shoot TTL in the snow. Luckily the day that I received my beta units was the largest snowstorm we have received here in Indianapolis all season. Not only that, but my friend David VanDeman had also invited me to tag along for his photoshoot with the Fashion Wrap up. Needless to say with all the snow, and the capabilities of these Flex units plus the style of Kaitlin Elyse, (That's Kaitlin above trying not to freeze while I do a light test), the look of Chelsea, hair and makeup by Allure Salon and the accessories of Apricot Lane.......we had an exciting afternoon in front of us.
That's Chelsea there. Very pretty girl, very good at the modeling gig. She did an absolutely outstanding job in such a terribly cold environment. She struck the poses, and made the shots very instinctively and very smoothly. It went especially well since we stopped about every other minute to put a jacket on her. Despite how cold it was though, and despite every bit of white that was out there, this shot was done shooting nothing but TTL and the Pocket Wizard FLEX units. A single Flex TT5, and the TT1 on my D3s as the shooting info suggests. In just a few frames I had this shot, and it was just like I wanted. The units performed just as flawlessly as Chelsea. The FLEX Units performed so flawlessly in fact, that during the course of the shoot I fired only 50 frames, including test shots, and shots of David scraping the windows of his car...
That there is another Canon shooter that if you've read the you'll recognize as Michael Guio. Mike was gracious to donate an evening of his to help me as a model while I evaluated the units in several ways. The first thing we did though, was test the units in my every day shooting style. I easily could have that the image above with the SU-800 (and some shots that evening were actually shot with it, instead of the Flex Units), but what I wanted to know was how the Flex Units did in terms of predictability. Here's what his basement looked like without the lights...
This is where I had some of the very few issues that I had with the Pocket Wizard Flex TT5 and TT1 units. When it came to TTL and 1 light, they were flawless. When it came to TTL and 2 lights, they seemed to be cancelling each other out in cross lighting situations. This was easily remedied by changing the lights to Manual, and probably could have been remedied by attaching the SU-800 to a TT5 unit or with an AC3 command unit. I was not supplied with an AC3 unit, and was also unable to get my SU-800 to function with my Beta units, but I have been assured the issue is corrected in the final hardware revision. I know that all sounds horribly technical, and for that I apologize, but either way the punchline should reach home for everyone. I got the shot. It just wasn't like I thought getting the shot would be (which it often isn't anyway, which the previous blog talks about more). In the card Shark shoot, I was using two hard lights because I wanted to simulate a hard puddle lit back room in a club; where this guy could be dangerous. I did attempt several shots using a softbox on one light, but it just didn't provide me the shot I was looking for.
I definitely found that the TTL on the Flex TT1 and TT5 worked better on Spot metering, but in terms of actually firing the lights held up to the epic standard that pocket wizard is known for. The units were very, VERY reliable. My only concern is that they fell asleep a few times while I was shooting. Playing around in the ControlTL software, I was unable to find a way to shut the sleep time off either, which annoyed me. Either way if you are conscious, it's not a big deal. Just burn an extra frame before you start going to wake them up, and you're in business. Not that I want to miss a shot because my units were asleep though. I did make sure to mention it several times in my writeup to Pocket Wizard.
These New pocket wizards not only support High Speed Sync, but also support up to 8fps firing rate if your flash is set low enough that it can handle bursts at that speed. Me, being the fool that I am made my first attempt using TTL at this speed, to which I was pleasantly surprised. Again spot metering was king of this test, and from time to time the camera would slow down while in TTL, but it was still surprisingly snappy when used that way.
In the end the high speed 8fps test wasn't what I had hoped even though I got few shots that looked very nice; but it also begged me to realize something I myself in the past have preached. Just because you can do something; doesn't mean you need to...
So instead, I found a better way to test the 8fps High Speed Sync with the Flex units with my girlfriend Shannon.
Shannon loves the snow; especially playing in it. She is also a Poi Dancer, which is something else I'd like to shoot her doing, but it seemed a bit too frigid to have her out swinging fire around in spandex. Snowballs seemed appropriate. It was easy for her to work up to throwing snowballs at me as relatively frequently I say or do something that gets her aggravated at me, but I think the snow playing got the best of her as every frame I have she's grinning like the happiest girl int he world. Just the way I like her. Again as mentioned before, the Pocket Wizard Flex TT5 and TT1 Units performed Flawlessly outside, even at a distance (albeit a small one as compared to the guys over at Fstoppers).
Some will notice my lack of light modifiers in these tests, and I noticed it too as I am mentioning it now. The thing is that I did use soft-boxes and umbrellas for a few other things, but felt the shots that were without Created more desirable images. Rare, I know, but true. Plus I may or may not have a few other images I'm holding back from these tests for the future, so keep your eyes peeled.
Conclusion: (finally, I know right?)
Will I buy em? Hell yea! Will they be epic? HELL Yea! Do I still have some experimenting to do? Hell yea! Wait what? Like I said earlier, I couldn't get my SU-800 to work with my beta units. I also was not given an AC3 unit to test with my TT1 and two TT5 units. This leaves a window of testing that is very important to me untouched. I LOVE the iTTL capabilities of my Nikon SU-800 and Accompanying strobes, and that's why a lot of people own Nikon Gear. It's not the Resolution, Autofocus system, or the fact that the lenses are black. It's the fact that they can light stuff very intuitively, and that is the part of this system I didn't get to play a whole lot with. That seems like a BIG part though right? yes and no. Is having 1/8000th of a second shutter-speed available in RF important, even if the strobes are on manual? Hell yea it is! That and shooting outside with these so I can use my 85 F1.4, or my 50F1.4, makes them totally worth the money (at least for me). The other part is that these units are capable of syncing with the older Plus II Transcievers, which makes the 7 of those that I have even more valuable to me. Now, I can't do a high speed sync, but I can set a light pretty far away, and just trigger it like normal; and there's nothing wrong with that.
The saavy shooters out there, are now saying that nothing I've done here is groundbreaking, and they are right. Having only 48 Hours to evaluate the units, I wanted to test what was most important to me; and that was the functionality. I had no time to get an 800mm Lens from Sigma like fstoppers. I did find time to physically break one of the units, but that's part of the test right? If they weren't meant to be used, why would you buy them?
Hopefully this quick review of the Beta units sheds some light on their operation to at least a few people. I've got a set pre-ordered from Roberts here in Indianapolis, where I buy almost all of my equipment. Get on the list, as the list is LONG. These units are most certainly worth buying if you like using your speedlights to shoot everyday, or just from time to time. For more information, check the following links:
Pocket Wizard Website (For more information)
Roberts Camera (For pre-order)
The FStoppers Review, and their latest Photoshop Contest
Another Reivew
More Soon.
First off I'd like to mention that I was not paid for this review, and am not going to say 100% positive things about these units, however I know that the units that I tested were in the beta stages and most of the very few problems that I encountered have been solved in the final hardware that is shipping over seas even while I write this. So for you tech nerds out there, are you ready for the nitty gritty? Hope so, because there's a lot of it. For you photo nerds out there, I hope the pictures are just as interesting...
 |
Anyone who shoots with Nikons CLS system knows how hard it can be to shoot TTL in the snow. Luckily the day that I received my beta units was the largest snowstorm we have received here in Indianapolis all season. Not only that, but my friend David VanDeman had also invited me to tag along for his photoshoot with the Fashion Wrap up. Needless to say with all the snow, and the capabilities of these Flex units plus the style of Kaitlin Elyse, (That's Kaitlin above trying not to freeze while I do a light test), the look of Chelsea, hair and makeup by Allure Salon and the accessories of Apricot Lane.......we had an exciting afternoon in front of us.
 |
| Nikon D3s, 100ISO, Nikon AFS50mmF1.4, 1/1600th@F2. Single Nikon SB-900 Speedlight set to iTTL zoomed in to 85mm shot through a 32" translucent umbrella attached to a Pocket Wizard TT5 Transceiver on the end of a paint pole and Kasey Pole softbox attachment adapter Speedlight fired by Pocket Wizard TT1 attached to the camera. |
That's Chelsea there. Very pretty girl, very good at the modeling gig. She did an absolutely outstanding job in such a terribly cold environment. She struck the poses, and made the shots very instinctively and very smoothly. It went especially well since we stopped about every other minute to put a jacket on her. Despite how cold it was though, and despite every bit of white that was out there, this shot was done shooting nothing but TTL and the Pocket Wizard FLEX units. A single Flex TT5, and the TT1 on my D3s as the shooting info suggests. In just a few frames I had this shot, and it was just like I wanted. The units performed just as flawlessly as Chelsea. The FLEX Units performed so flawlessly in fact, that during the course of the shoot I fired only 50 frames, including test shots, and shots of David scraping the windows of his car...
 |
| Nikon D3s, 160ISO, Nikon AFS28-70F2.8@70mm. 1/200th@F13. Single Nikon SB900 zoomed to 200mm with a 1/4CTO fired by a Pocket Wizard Flex TT5 attached to a SC-28 off camera cable on a pole to camera right set to iTTL. (SC-28 Off camera cable was used to attach the TT5 because the TT5 was too large to fit into the hot shoe mount of the Softbox stand adapter I was using). Second SB-900 Speedlight zoomed to 200mm about 30' to camera left with a 1/2 CTB, set to iTTL -3.0. The camera was also set to -.3EV to account that the light on the left wasn't dark enough.) |
That there is another Canon shooter that if you've read the you'll recognize as Michael Guio. Mike was gracious to donate an evening of his to help me as a model while I evaluated the units in several ways. The first thing we did though, was test the units in my every day shooting style. I easily could have that the image above with the SU-800 (and some shots that evening were actually shot with it, instead of the Flex Units), but what I wanted to know was how the Flex Units did in terms of predictability. Here's what his basement looked like without the lights...
 |
| Ambient Light in Mike's basement. Nikon D3s, 1600ISO, 1/40th@F2.8 |
This is where I had some of the very few issues that I had with the Pocket Wizard Flex TT5 and TT1 units. When it came to TTL and 1 light, they were flawless. When it came to TTL and 2 lights, they seemed to be cancelling each other out in cross lighting situations. This was easily remedied by changing the lights to Manual, and probably could have been remedied by attaching the SU-800 to a TT5 unit or with an AC3 command unit. I was not supplied with an AC3 unit, and was also unable to get my SU-800 to function with my Beta units, but I have been assured the issue is corrected in the final hardware revision. I know that all sounds horribly technical, and for that I apologize, but either way the punchline should reach home for everyone. I got the shot. It just wasn't like I thought getting the shot would be (which it often isn't anyway, which the previous blog talks about more). In the card Shark shoot, I was using two hard lights because I wanted to simulate a hard puddle lit back room in a club; where this guy could be dangerous. I did attempt several shots using a softbox on one light, but it just didn't provide me the shot I was looking for.
 |
| Nikon D3s, 200ISO, Nikon AFS28-70mmF2.8@50mm, 1/200th@F13. Single Nikon SB900 zoomed to 200mm with a 1/4CTO fired by a Pocket Wizard Flex TT5 attached to a SC-28 off camera cable on a pole to camera right set to iTTL. (SC-28 Off camera cable was used to attach the TT5 because the TT5 was too large to fit into the hot shoe mount of the Softbox stand adapter I was using). Second SB-900 Speedlight zoomed to 200mm about 30' to camera left with a 1/2 CTB, set to iTTL -2.0. The camera was also set to +.3EV as I needed to make a small adjustment, but didn't want to go back to the left speedlight.) |
I definitely found that the TTL on the Flex TT1 and TT5 worked better on Spot metering, but in terms of actually firing the lights held up to the epic standard that pocket wizard is known for. The units were very, VERY reliable. My only concern is that they fell asleep a few times while I was shooting. Playing around in the ControlTL software, I was unable to find a way to shut the sleep time off either, which annoyed me. Either way if you are conscious, it's not a big deal. Just burn an extra frame before you start going to wake them up, and you're in business. Not that I want to miss a shot because my units were asleep though. I did make sure to mention it several times in my writeup to Pocket Wizard.
These New pocket wizards not only support High Speed Sync, but also support up to 8fps firing rate if your flash is set low enough that it can handle bursts at that speed. Me, being the fool that I am made my first attempt using TTL at this speed, to which I was pleasantly surprised. Again spot metering was king of this test, and from time to time the camera would slow down while in TTL, but it was still surprisingly snappy when used that way.
 |
| This string of shots were shot at 8fps, with a Nikon D3s. While the added light of the Pocket Wizards made the 4000ISO very clean and usable in commercial print, I deemed that the frozen speed-bag action wasn't what I was looking for. |
 |
| Nikon D3s, 400ISO, Nikon AFS28-70F2.8@45mm, 1/200th@F11. Camera set to -2EV with the Pocket Wizard TT1 on the hot shoe. Nikon SB900 Speedlight zoomed to 75mm set to iTTL with a light green Gel attached to a Pocket Wizard TT5 Transmitter. Nikon SB900 Zoomed to 200mm above camera left with a Theatrical red Gel, set to TTL on a Pocket Wizard TT5 Transmitter as well. Both Hard lights, no modifiers. |
So instead, I found a better way to test the 8fps High Speed Sync with the Flex units with my girlfriend Shannon.
 |
| Nikon D3s, 200ISO, Nikon AFS70-200F2.8N VR2@110mm, 1/1250th@F6.3. Pocket Wizard Flex TT1 Unit on the Cameras Hot Shoe, Nikon SB-900 to Shannon's right about 15 feet in the air angled down attached to a Pocket Wizard TT5 Transceiver. |
Shannon loves the snow; especially playing in it. She is also a Poi Dancer, which is something else I'd like to shoot her doing, but it seemed a bit too frigid to have her out swinging fire around in spandex. Snowballs seemed appropriate. It was easy for her to work up to throwing snowballs at me as relatively frequently I say or do something that gets her aggravated at me, but I think the snow playing got the best of her as every frame I have she's grinning like the happiest girl int he world. Just the way I like her. Again as mentioned before, the Pocket Wizard Flex TT5 and TT1 Units performed Flawlessly outside, even at a distance (albeit a small one as compared to the guys over at Fstoppers).
Some will notice my lack of light modifiers in these tests, and I noticed it too as I am mentioning it now. The thing is that I did use soft-boxes and umbrellas for a few other things, but felt the shots that were without Created more desirable images. Rare, I know, but true. Plus I may or may not have a few other images I'm holding back from these tests for the future, so keep your eyes peeled.
Conclusion: (finally, I know right?)
Will I buy em? Hell yea! Will they be epic? HELL Yea! Do I still have some experimenting to do? Hell yea! Wait what? Like I said earlier, I couldn't get my SU-800 to work with my beta units. I also was not given an AC3 unit to test with my TT1 and two TT5 units. This leaves a window of testing that is very important to me untouched. I LOVE the iTTL capabilities of my Nikon SU-800 and Accompanying strobes, and that's why a lot of people own Nikon Gear. It's not the Resolution, Autofocus system, or the fact that the lenses are black. It's the fact that they can light stuff very intuitively, and that is the part of this system I didn't get to play a whole lot with. That seems like a BIG part though right? yes and no. Is having 1/8000th of a second shutter-speed available in RF important, even if the strobes are on manual? Hell yea it is! That and shooting outside with these so I can use my 85 F1.4, or my 50F1.4, makes them totally worth the money (at least for me). The other part is that these units are capable of syncing with the older Plus II Transcievers, which makes the 7 of those that I have even more valuable to me. Now, I can't do a high speed sync, but I can set a light pretty far away, and just trigger it like normal; and there's nothing wrong with that.
The saavy shooters out there, are now saying that nothing I've done here is groundbreaking, and they are right. Having only 48 Hours to evaluate the units, I wanted to test what was most important to me; and that was the functionality. I had no time to get an 800mm Lens from Sigma like fstoppers. I did find time to physically break one of the units, but that's part of the test right? If they weren't meant to be used, why would you buy them?
Hopefully this quick review of the Beta units sheds some light on their operation to at least a few people. I've got a set pre-ordered from Roberts here in Indianapolis, where I buy almost all of my equipment. Get on the list, as the list is LONG. These units are most certainly worth buying if you like using your speedlights to shoot everyday, or just from time to time. For more information, check the following links:
Pocket Wizard Website (For more information)
Roberts Camera (For pre-order)
The FStoppers Review, and their latest Photoshop Contest
Another Reivew
More Soon.
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