What lighting do you suggest?

[natil0ve]

Hi, my goal is to start my own little portrait studio in my home and am thinking of buying a 300-400 dollar light kit on ebay. I read a review that suggested buying flashes (which are also portable) instead. I'm also afraid the quality of the equipment won't be good and I might throw my money down the toilet.

Thankyou!

[carl yeomans]

go do some research & reading. you can start here Lighting Rumours | Photographic lighting news and vapourware, all in one place

[Jim Poor]

Alien Bees are great for studio work.
I also did studio lighting with SB800 &900s for quite a while, but they will cost you more than the Bees.

[SusanH1970]

Originally Posted by Jim Poor

Alien Bees are great for studio work.
I also did studio lighting with SB800 &900s for quite a while, but they will cost you more than the Bees.

Yup! For under $500, you can get an Alien Bee, softbox, and a reflector. Great way to start off using one light, then add more as you learn more about lighting. I have an AB400 and a 40x60 reflector and it works wonderfully for my studio work. It's also all quite portable (I work on location most of the time) and setup/takedown go very quickly.

[Statto]

Hi Natil0ve

Ive heard some bad things about 'cheap kits'
The three main problems being
1) Lack of function (maybe only fires 80% of the time it should do)
But you personally may not find this a problem
2) Lack of consistent colour
Again, if you are shooting in RAW and dont mind tweaking the white balance slightly this may not be a problem to you
3) Agressive use causes units to overheat
Again, this depends on you and how much are you gonna hammer them, are you looking at a 45min shoot then a rest of 4 hrs then a 45min shoot? Or are you looking at almost constant shooting for, say, 4hrs?

You beasically get what ya pay for, If you buy a cheap set, then its gonna be hard to sell it on when you wanna upgrade, so its almost like lost money
If you spend the same money on ONE light/softbox from a reputable comany, with the veiw that you will buy anoth light every year, youll have a professional set up in 3yrs (4 lights with 2 softboxes)

Its all up to you

As a help, why not rent a professional studio for the day, get used to the good quality, high power lights, then at least you have a bench mark to where you wanna be (lighting wise) in say 5 yrs time

Hope this helps

P.S. I go down th erenting route
When I get clients who want studio work, I rent a professional studio, I could argue that I could have bought a good set of lights by now, but, Im also renting the space/backdrops/changing room etc etc
Its all down to your personal choice

[natil0ve]

thankyou all very much! very helpful!