high speed flash two images combined

Elinchrom ELC500 TTL studio flash

A new generation from Swiss masters of studio flash Elinca SA brings multi-platform TTL, super-fast recycling and flash durations, brilliant LED modelling and many design innovations. David Kilpatrick has been trying out the twin head kit.

The second wave of any innovation in technology is often safer to invest in than the pioneering first generation. Studio flash offering IGBT duration and power control, allowing much the same TTL and high speed functions found in camera speedlights, has been in development for over a decade but whole generations have been orphaned by advances in wireless trigger and camera firmware.

Finally bringing this to their new mid-range ELC TTL heads – one rung below the ELC Pro and one above the BRX – Elinchrom has worked for maturity in the whole technology. So, when the ELC 125 and 500 TTL arrived they worked much like any head with the EL Skyport Pro. Days later new firmware for the triggers enabled TTL operation, across a range of camera platforms already proven with the portable ELB 500 TTL.

The ELC 125 TTL is a little larger than a D-Lite. The ELC 500 TTL is substantial – as expected.
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Hasselblad is new UK Broncolor agent

Hasselblad is set to become sole distributor of broncolor lighting products in the UK.

’We will use the same approach with bron as we have with the new-look Hasselblad UK’ – Chris Russell-Fish, Hasselblad UK MD and Global Sales and Marketing Director

Chris Russell-Fish, Hasselblad UK MD and global sales and marketing director, announced the move following months of negotiation with the Swiss-based lighting manufacturer.

Hasselblad will take over from JP Distribution on July 1st and promises ‘a dynamic array of new ideas and solutions‘ for bron customers nationwide in coming months.

Said Russell-Fish: “I believe we can do a great job for bron users in the UK. Like Hasselblad products, bron equipment sits at the top end of the market. We plan to make a great deal of noise in coming weeks and months around this excellent lighting range.”

Russell-Fish has appointed photo-lighting expert Chris Burfoot as the new broncolor UK manager.

Burfoot, who first started ‘working with light’ in the Eighties said: “Our objective is to create far more awareness around the award-winning bron brand and focus hard on customer service and support for existing users. We also plan a programme of ‘hands-on’ open days with broncolor partners in a non-selling environment – mirroring the success of the popular ‘Hasselblad Studiodays’ programme, and under the name of ‘The beauty of broncolor’.

This premium lighting brand has been built on a rock solid foundation of quality, consistency and reliability. The new-look bron customer care programme will work in exactly the same way as Hasselblad’s renowned ‘Hasselbuddy’ customer care support.”

Hasselblad UK owns the London-based Pro Centre, the photo-equipment rental company, but Russell-Fish insists the bron distribution deal will be no threat to any other brand they work with.

He said: “The Pro Centre acts completely independently as a rental centre. This will simply be an additional line. Bron will be a completely separate entity for us in the same way as our new Hasselblad studio and Didgeridoo services. And just as we have developed energetic new programmes for Hasselblad customers in the UK, we will do the same with bron over time. There will be a separate bron customer care and maintenance team in place in the near future.”

Hasselblad is currently in talks with broncolor with a view to new product launches.

A new website is to go live from the 1st July 2011 at www.ukbroncolor.com, with links to and from the Hasselblad (www.hasselblad.co.uk) website.

Sekonic's camera calibration

The Sekonic Digitalmaster L-758D meter offers the solution to variable ISO/EI ratings, and apparent sensitivity and contrast curves variations found in DSLRs. With a USB interface to link it up to a PC/Mac calibration program, the L-758D can remember three different cameras, two types of lighting (ambient or flash) and two measuring methods (incident or reflected) plus a range of ISO values for each of the cameras. There are twelve basic ‘profiles’ that can be stored, and within each profile a range from ISO 3 to ISO 8000.

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Using a low-cost IKEA spotlight for studio effect

IKEA has a very low cost optical focusing theatre-style spotlight which can be used, or adapted, for studio work. It comes complete with an adjustable iris diaphragm unit, a four-blade square aperture adjustable unit, a gobo/filter holder, a set of stainless steel cut gobos and a set of coloured glass filters. The focusing lens is not sealed against light leaks but open to allow heat to dissipate, however if this unit was adapted to hold a flash light source in place of its halogen bulb, you could also make a tube to seal off the light leaks from the optical assembly.

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