Safari MK1

TG.

Messages
6,607
Name
Tel
Edit My Images
No
I recently picked up a s/h Safari 1 for a very good price, I wanted to experiment shooting and overpowering the sun however this doesn't have HSS and I would really like to do this with something like F4 or 2.8 to really make the subject stand out my Godox X1n trigger and X1r receiver seem to work out fine with the light at even 8000th of a second just testing indoors, so just wondered what sort of problems if any I might run into whilst trying outside trying to overpower the sun, your thoughts much appreciated
 
IIRC if you use a HSS capable trigger, it'll utilise hypersync/supersync/tailsync

And again IIRC there's something odd you have to do to ensure you get a full power flash, but memory fades, clearly Garry will know.

And you might want to try a 3 or 4 stop ND instead of the faster SS.
 
  • Like
Reactions: TG.
IIRC if you use a HSS capable trigger, it'll utilise hypersync/supersync/tailsync

And again IIRC there's something odd you have to do to ensure you get a full power flash, but memory fades, clearly Garry will know.

And you might want to try a 3 or 4 stop ND instead of the faster SS.
No, nothing odd that I know about, just turn the knob up to full and away you go:).
Everything else you say is right, personally I prefer to use a ND filter
 
personally I prefer to use a ND filter

Why Garry not a criticism, just curious as I only have one which is a 10 stop :) and I'm thinking of the extra faffing :)
 
It's just simpler (IMO).
And there are other things you can do, for example you can use a grad filter to darken the sky, and if there's a fair bit of sky in the shot you can set a faster shutter speed and turn the camera upside down, so that the second shutter curtain blocks the flash only where it doesn't matter, on the sky.

Having said that, I don't have a 10 stop and I can't help wondering whether anything more than about 4 stop is actually usable (except of course for typical 10 stop use, with the camera on a tripod and the scene previewed without the filter).
 
Safari Mk1 has quite a long flash duration so works well with tail-hypersync - longer duration reduces the fall-off in brightness that inevitably occurs from bottom to top of the image as the flash pulse fades, usually around a couple of stops - sometimes a bit less, sometimes quite a lot more. It varies according to flash unit, power setting, camera model and shutter speed. Some triggers allow you to adjust the timing off-set to optimise settings.

Ways to reduce fall-off:
- Shoot in daylight, so the ambient light masks the flash fall-off. By the same token, avoid plain backgrounds with low ambient light, eg studio!
- Keep the main subject away from the top and bottom of the frame so avoiding the extremes of fall-off.
- Just doing these two things is often all you need.
- Use the inverse square law by positioning the light close to the subject on the pentaprism side of the camera, ie from above, or turn the camera vertical if the flash is left/right. With the light close, there will be a natural ISL fading in brightness that - if you're lucky/cunning - will neatly counter-balance the tail-hypersync fall-off.
- Sort it out in post processing, with graduated filter and local adjustment tools.

The ND filter method avoids all these issues, providing you don't need a fast shutter speed to freeze movement. The filter just darkens the whole image, so you can stay under the x-sync limit and maximise flash brightness, with no side-effects. Two or three stops ND is about the limit, before the camera's viewfinder gets too dark for easy working.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: TG.
It's just simpler (IMO).
And there are other things you can do, for example you can use a grad filter to darken the sky, and if there's a fair bit of sky in the shot you can set a faster shutter speed and turn the camera upside down, so that the second shutter curtain blocks the flash only where it doesn't matter, on the sky.

Having said that, I don't have a 10 stop and I can't help wondering whether anything more than about 4 stop is actually usable (except of course for typical 10 stop use, with the camera on a tripod and the scene previewed without the filter).
I'd forgotten about the upside down camera "trick".
 
Back
Top