Firing a strobe in Slave mode

[ndwgolf]

In my home studio I’m using 2 x Profoto B1 heads and recently added a Godox MS300 to use as a background light or a floor light bouncing light off a white polystyrene board.
I’m finding the MS300 a wee bitty hit and miss with getting it to Fire in either S1 or S2 (Slave modes)

Is there a trick to getting it to fire all the time?

 

[Phil V]

First, I can’t assume you know the difference between the 2 slave modes?
S1 is standard optical slave, S2 is for firing it in conjunction with ETTL flashes, so it ignores pre flashes*

The trick is that it has to be able to ‘see’ the light from the keylight or other flashes.

I’d say the common error is that there’s a tendency to use the ‘less good’ flash as a 3rd light, which often means it’s out of the way somewhere.

The trick is to consider the placement of the slave flash whilst planning your lights, and it might be that you’ll want to use it as a key or fill so that it’s out in the open and can see the other lights.

It’s only counterintuitive because you’ve got 2 expensive lights so you want those where you can see them, with the cheap flash ‘out of the way’ doing a less important job. But the ‘light’ has no idea whether it was created by profoto or Godox.

This might cause complications with your modifiers, as they’re different fits.

*and this of course means if it’s partially hidden you’re encouraging it to ignore a weak flash it might be able to see

I’ll do a pt2

 

[Phil V]

If because of modifiers you actually need the Godox out of the way, then you either need to add a profoto compatible receiver* to it, or somehow add a Godox transmitter into your mix. The x2t has a pass through so you could piggyback transmitters

*I don’t even know if there is such a thing, and if there is it’d probably cost as much as the ms300

 

[ndwgolf]

Phill all my modifiers are Bowen Mount so no issues mix matching. I don’t use TTL so have the Godox set to S1.
I just closed that large skylight in my studio and it’s started firing so Im guessing that big bright light coming from the skylight was masking the flash from the key light (Profoto)

 

[Phil V]

Yeah, the one thing I didn’t mention was a high ambient light level.

 

[Garry Edwards]

I just closed that large skylight in my studio and it’s started firing so Im guessing that big bright light coming from the skylight was masking the flash from the key light (Profoto)

Yes, strong ambient light can be a killer, it isn't so much the strength of the flash that counts as the difference in intensity, so problem hopefully now solved.

But, one further point that may raise its ugly head at some point. It the slave cell can't see the flash it can't respond to it. You don't need line of sight but if, for example the slave is fitted with a softbox, blocking line of sight, you'll need to have a level of bounced light reaching the slave cell.