Focus lights, modeling lights and aiming lights

[Dee]

I've found the same thing as Mo2.....if my D-180 focusing light in on the subject, my strobe is out of place.

I use an LED light mounted on the right of my tray so I don't need to hold it. This gives a nice light without a sharp beam so it never shows up in the photos. The LED light is also brighter than I really like for night dives so I added apiece of red film to it and it worked great. Bright enough for focusing and the red didn't bother the creatures like these very light sensitives aemones.

 

[Wildcard]

The idea is almost as awsome as that photo! Cool little fish in there too.

 

[Dee]

Every one of those night photos revealed something I wasn't expecting and/or hadn't seen.

 

[Wildcard]

night time nokaoi ! Did you see the black water pics? In Hawaii ohana.

 

[Dee]

No, I'll go check them out....

Well, Pooh! On every single attachment, I get this message... Warning: fopen(/usr/attachments/2/7/0/5/2/34847.attach): failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /attachment.php on line 168

 

[f3nikon]

I disagree with f3nikon.

My Inon D-180 batteries have never died on me because of using the focus light. Even if you had to change batteries after a dive that is not a problem. It's not as inconvenient as changing batteries on the camera when on a boat. You may have to change batteries in a separate focus light as well.

The focus light being in the strobe head has never been an issue as respects the camera focusing on the subject. I don't see what difference the location of the focusing light makes so long as it lights up the subject in order for the camera to focus on the subject.

You have to manipulate the strobe head to get the focus light on the subject but you have to do that anyway to get the strobe to fire on the subject. The focus light tells you if the strobe is on the subject so it's not a negative but a benefit. If the light is mounted on the camera you still have to manipulate the strobe head and you don't have the advantage of the focus light to help aim the strobe head. Then you somehow have to get the light out of the picture before taking it or it will be in the photo. I consider that an inconvenience.

The diffuser has a hole cut out in it for the focus light so it does not interfere with it.

IMHO I think Inon's placing a focus light in their strobe heads was a stroke of genius. It works, it saves one from having to carry an extra light and it works in sync with the strobe as it goes off when the strobe fires. How much easier can that get?

Nice work on you latest Maui pics. I agree with some of your comments but not the first one about the separate focusing light. Changing your batteries on the boat increases your changes of flooding or getting a drop or two of saltwater on the battery contacts (not good). I would much rather flood a $20 flashlight than a $$$ strobe, plus since they are not sharing batteries they will hold their charge much longer.

I am with you on aiming the strobe straight on the subject although there are some who are sold on the "paint with the edge of the light" method. The 4 D batteries are from my Ikelite Ai strobe and is very heavy, if the Inon only uses 4 AA batteries on their strobes, then the focusing light is not really a focusing light but an aiming light.

Because to get any usefull lighting from 4 AA batteries the bulb's reflector has to throw out a very narrow beam like a penlight. This is why Inon has to turn the aiming light off before taking the picture, to avoid getting the spot on the final image. Ikelites fousing light puts out a wider beam but gets kicked down with the diffuser installed.