Neweer NW985N Multi Strobe Flash

[Jim_Tod]

I bought some of these NW985N flashguns looking to use them for stroboscopic shots, moving rugby ball, multiple exposure of a dancer dancing type thing.

I planned to trigger 3 of them from my camera using neweer fcr-16 triggers

I've used the flashgun for other shots and I'm quite happy with normal performance and how easy the menu system is to get what I need in manual

Trying the stroboscopic shots I can only get one flash from the gun through a trigger. I thought if I set it up for a 1 second exposure with the gun on multi at 10Hz and 10 flashes then I'd have 10 pulses on the one exposure. When I put it in the hotshoe that's what I get but I was hoping for off camera.

The closest I get to is setting up with a pc sync cord plugged in and doing Continuous High shooting with the flash in manual power and I get the pulses but it would mean blending in PP- not the end of the world and I'd be able to use the multiple flashes I was expecting but seems a bit strange that the flash needs to be on camera to be stroboscopic.

Any thoughts or advice on this or what I could try to get the strobe effect with a trigger?

 

[Phil V]

You need smart triggers to use the stroboscopic function of your speedlights, so probably receivers too.

This is what happens when ‘box shifters’ sell technology. They package up technically incompatible products, they’ll ‘work’ together, but they don’t really work together.

 

[Jim_Tod]

You need smart triggers to use the stroboscopic function of your speedlights, so probably receivers too.

Thanks Phil- is there a particular brand/ model that you were thinking off? I'm struggling a bit with the terminology on the manufacturers websites but I'm assuming it's an HSS type aility for multiple repetitive flashes that's needed even although it's not HSS- trigger wise it seems the same in principle to me.

The flash and remote are fine for 99% of what I want to do- it's just a specific project that I appear to not have done my research properly and made a poor assumption

 

[Phil V]

Hi Jim
I think the Yongnuo triggers would do it. But I don’t have time to check.
YN622 tx and YN622c are what to look out for, and I might know where there’s some for sale shortly.

But. I’m not 100% confidant that your speedlights will have the power to do what you want with the dancers.
Keen to see the results.

 

[Scooter]

I did something like this a few years ago. I used 4 SB900's I remember that you couldn't set the repeating flash on the actual flashguns and then just trigger them - you needed another light on the camera as a commander to tell them to strobe every time. The commander flash doesn't strobe, but it needs to tell the remotes to strobe every time. The YN565 flash though, could be set and would just strobe at whatever you set it to when it was triggered - but whatever you decided to trigger it with. This is specific to Nikon mind - so your own mileage may vary The YN622 system may do it - I'll test it later. Another possible way to to do it is to set the flashes to whatever mode they are in when on-camera and in strobe mode and enable the slave cell. I've since discovered my SB900's will happily emulate just about any flickering light pattern in SU4 - auto mode (where it emulates the duration of the flashes as well) as long as there's enough juice in the capacitors - florescent lights starting up, LED torch with a strobe mode, other flashes etc.. Incidentally - the Lencarta SF600's will also do this and I've used them in strobe mode by aiming and SB900 on RPT directly at the slave eye on low power.

In terms of power, I had 4 lights suspended up above a theatre stage (we hung them on 25mm doweling rods from the actually lighting rig so could move them up and down on the motors - they were right up there though as I needed a fair field of light with some overlap. They pointed straight down and the dancer moved over a taped line on the stage under the lights. We ended up shooting at f/4 and ISO 500 at 5Hz with the lights turned up as far as they would go (somewhere between 1/8 and 1/4). The images are not the last word in quality tbh passable, but get the flashes closer if you can. 10Hz is probably asking a bit too much, although I think my shots were more lie 5 seconds. How many pulses per second you end up using will also depend ont he speed of the subject - we found any more than 5 just merged together. We also tried 4, but they looked too separate.

http://owenlloydphotography.com/?p=678

 

[Jim_Tod]

Hi Jim
I think the Yongnuo triggers would do it. But I don’t have time to check.
YN622 tx and YN622c are what to look out for, and I might know where there’s some for sale shortly.

But. I’m not 100% confidant that your speedlights will have the power to do what you want with the dancers.
Keen to see the results.

I did something like this a few years ago. I used 4 SB900's I remember that you couldn't set the repeating flash on the actual flashguns and then just trigger them - you needed another light on the camera as a commander to tell them to strobe every time. The commander flash doesn't strobe, but it needs to tell the remotes to strobe every time. The YN565 flash though, could be set and would just strobe at whatever you set it to when it was triggered - but whatever you decided to trigger it with. This is specific to Nikon mind - so your own mileage may vary The YN622 system may do it - I'll test it later. Another possible way to to do it is to set the flashes to whatever mode they are in when on-camera and in strobe mode and enable the slave cell. I've since discovered my SB900's will happily emulate just about any flickering light pattern in SU4 - auto mode (where it emulates the duration of the flashes as well) as long as there's enough juice in the capacitors - florescent lights starting up, LED torch with a strobe mode, other flashes etc.. Incidentally - the Lencarta SF600's will also do this and I've used them in strobe mode by aiming and SB900 on RPT directly at the slave eye on low power.

In terms of power, I had 4 lights suspended up above a theatre stage (we hung them on 25mm doweling rods from the actually lighting rig so could move them up and down on the motors - they were right up there though as I needed a fair field of light with some overlap. They pointed straight down and the dancer moved over a taped line on the stage under the lights. We ended up shooting at f/4 and ISO 500 at 5Hz with the lights turned up as far as they would go (somewhere between 1/8 and 1/4). The images are not the last word in quality tbh passable, but get the flashes closer if you can. 10Hz is probably asking a bit too much, although I think my shots were more lie 5 seconds. How many pulses per second you end up using will also depend ont he speed of the subject - we found any more than 5 just merged together. We also tried 4, but they looked too separate.

Thanks gents. It is an amatuer project so nothing commercial- just one of those types of shots I'd like to work through.

I'll try with a strobe flash as a commander and see what happens before 'investing' more in smart slash (unless some come up on a good deal in the classifieds)