Fan of Alien Bees?

BBones

Just trying to get an idea of these lighting systems are any good. The price for the DigiBee setup sounds great but I am wondering if they are throwing in the low quality stuff or at least not as desired.

John Mueller

I have 3 bees 2- 800's 1- 1600 and many accessories.Going to add a 400 for background light.
They seem to work well and have great support.
I do have a slight problem with the wireless system.They will miss fire about every eight shot
Overall they are great for the price

BBones

So you recommend bumping up from the B400 to the B800's? The Digibee package has the 400's standard

John Mueller

Yes,I would rather have more power and be able turn it down than to need more and not have it

Then again,it all depends on what your planning to do.

BBones

I want to start working more on my portrait work, I have low lighting down quite well and motorsport/highspeed is still my bread and butter, but I want to be able to do more and not get myself painted into a corner as a particular style of photog only.

Art Scott

BBones wrote:

I want to start working more on my portrait work, I have low lighting down quite well and motorsport/highspeed is still my bread and butter, but I want to be able to do more and not get myself painted into a corner as a particular style of photog only.

I too have been looking at the alien bees, but I have used Paul Buff lights for over 20 years and love them....I still shot portraits and small commerical work with White Lightening 5000's and they have been rebuilt twice as because I was using my living room as a studio for many years they doubled as house hold lamps....quite unique with umbrellas on as shades......and they as traveled to do weddings in Sacramento Ca from Ks also...they have been real work horses and the reflectors had been specially spun to create the effect of more light with less source light.......any way I would trust any Paul C Buff product from my past ewxperiences with them.

Good luck

spider-t

I love my B800's

BBones wrote:

So you recommend bumping up from the B400 to the B800's? The Digibee package has the 400's standard

I have 3 Alien Bees 800's. I started with one light + the large octabox + boom stand. You can get a lot done with a single light and a reflector.

I ended up buying 2 more 800's. Mostly to learn more lighting techniques.

Love them. I use them mostly for portrait work.

It's nice to have them all the same power so you can get a sense of the shadows from the modeling lights. But it's not essential.

cheers,
Trish