Beginners question.. please be gentle if answer is incredibly obvious:) I have just purchased the C2500L and the FL40 flash unit. I also have a small studio set up at home. May I ask how does one control the exposure in the C2500L for studio flash lighting. Is it via the manual setting and using shutter speed in conjunction with estimating the guide number or have I got things mixed up. Any help is greatly appreciated. Thank you Jane Hamilton.

-- jane hamilton (janenetnews@hotmail.com), February 29, 2000

Answers

Actually, this is one area the 2500 is *slightly* limited in. You'll normally want to control the effect of the studio flash via the aperture setting, but the 2500 doesn't have a full range of apertures (only two, as I recall). You'll need to pick the one that's closest to what seems needed and then adjust the lighting. If you don't yet have the flash setup, get one that has a continuously-variable output power control, and you'll be fine. (Most of the monolights have this, and Novatron makes some pack-based units with a continuously-variable output.) With these, you'd pick the f-stop in manual mode that you want for depth-of-field purposes, then adjust the strobe's output to match. Shutter speed probably doesn't matter a whole lot, you'll likely want to use a higher one in manual mode, so you don't get a lot of ambient light in the shot. Hope this helps!

-- Dave Etchells (web@imaging-resource.com), March 01, 2000.

Thank you David for your reply. In view of your comments is there any digital camera on the market, that I could use in a studio set up straight out of the box, (ie) as I could a traditional film camera. Would the Nikon 950 for example with full aperture control be a better choice for my purposes. Any advice or help would be most appreciated. Thank You Jane Hamilton.

-- Jane Hamilton (janenetnews@hotmail.com), March 01, 2000.