Controlling Portrait Lighting Education needed

[rickp1]

I'm on this road trying to learn about portrait photography lighting.
I've been doing A BUNCH of research on lighting kits and now I'm off to the next step of this trip. Triggering the light.

I googled portrait lighting and found a lot of info on where to setup the lights. I also found the different preferences and techniques used.

At this point I'm using 2 lights. One main, lets say with a beauty dish on it and a second with a softbox, I'll can also use a reflector.

So my question is how do I control the lights? I have a pocketwizard Mini TT1 and a Flex TT5, but that only controls 1 light. If i go this route I need another TT5.
If I use the cables, how does that work? I've never used them.

I'm sure this is REALLY elementary for some, but how do the cables trigger both lights, and how to I setup the camera to do this?


Any help on this would be very helpful.

Thanks
R.

[zona5101]

Control the lights or trigger the lights??
Different animals.
Which light kit are you working with?

You should have controls on the back of each light for power output. You will probably also have a switch that turns on or off a built in optical trigger. If these statements are true for your kit, then you really only need to trigger one with your PW and the other will fire via optical trigger.

Your mini will go on camera hot shoe, your tt5 will be with yout main light and hooked up via a cord to the light.
You fire the camera and the mini sends a signal to the tt5 and it fires the main. The light from the main optically triggers your second light.

[rickp1]

Zona,
thanks for the reply. You're right, trigger. I edited the post.

So it's that simple, just connect the TT5 to the main light and the second will shoot off the first? WOW. I thought it was more complicated than that.

I read that some put one of the lights on slave, what's that about?

I was also recommended to get a RF602 to trigger the lights. It's inexpensive and work well from my understanding.

R.

[zona5101]

Sure the RF602 will work.

OK so you have 2 studio lights. One is connected to the receiver of the wireless trigger (TT5). Receiver -->pc cord of some type --> flash
The second light can also be on a radio trigger receiver but if you only have one receiver then put the second like on slave mode and it will fire when the main fires.

Ya pretty much like that.

There are more sophisticated triggers and lights. For example there are radio sets that can raise and lower the light output levels of each flash head (it saves you from having to walk over to the head and change it - really handy when the light is out of your reach)

[rickp1]

I dont need a receiver for the second on slave? How does it communicate. Sory for the elementary questions. this is ALL new to me.

let me ask you this, how effective is it to use a monolight as a main/key light, then use a speedlite for a rim/hair light and a reflector as fill?( off to the side of the main)

The reason for that is, mobility.

R.

[zona5101]

The second light will fire from the optical sensor (assuming your unit. has that sensor) Also it maybe that your studio light has a sensor and the speedlight does not - not an issue put the reciever on the speedlight and let the main light fire as a slave.
A studio light as a main and a speedlight as a hair light is an excellect set up.

[timiroberts]

What types of studio strobes or speedlights are you working with?
As said, the speedlights should have an optical sensor built in that will trigger that flash to fire when it senses another flash has gone off. There are sometimes switches on the back of the flash that indicate M(manual) S1(slave - fire on flash) or S2(slave - fire on second flash)
If you don't have an optical sensor on your second flash, you might need to run a cable to the second flash while triggering the first flash with the PW.

[rickp1]

lights I'm using are an AB1600 and a 580ex II. I'm triggering them with PW Flex TT5.

R.

[zona5101]

Originally Posted by rickp1

lights I'm using are an AB1600 and a 580ex II. I'm triggering them with PW Flex TT5.

R.

Are you squared away on this or do you need some more assistance in getting it dialed in?

[rickp1]

I keep going over things in my head trying to come up with something I might be missing but at this point I think I'm OK. I need the gear to come in so I can get things setup and and get a hands on understanding of everything. Hopefully by end of next week I'll be able to do that.

Thanks, for everything, everyone helped tremendously.

R.