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[OM] A brief report on Alien Bees radio slaves

Subject: [OM] A brief report on Alien Bees radio slaves
From: Chuck Norcutt <chucknorcutt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Tue, 12 May 2009 16:36:21 -0400
Yesterday I received my set of one transmitter and two receivers from 
Alien Bees.  They are the CST transmitter and the CSRB receivers or 
first and next to last items on this page: 
<http://www.shootsmarter.com/content/view/151/>

These are the basic units that do triggering only.  The more 
sophisticated stuff can do a lot of fancy things like varying power 
output, triggering in groups, etc.  I decided I didn't really need that 
stuff since I have the wired remote that is able to vary power level on 
each light but I never use it.  But, if I was still shooting events in 
large halls with lights 13 feet in the air then I'd probably go for 
remote power control for ease of lighting setup.

When I was shooting at important events in the past I always had access 
to borrowed Pocket Wizards.  They have a long range and can be fired 
directly by my Sekonic L-358 flash meter.  But they are terribly 
expensive.  For my own use in portraiture and small groups I've used 
ebay slaves without too much trouble.  However, they seem to have 
deteriorated over several years.  They no longer reach the 45 - 125 foot 
range they used to (varies dramatically by unit) and, worse, they have 
become unreliable even at close range (10-15 feet).  Buying a new 16 
channel set that appeared to be more advanced didn't help.  New out of 
the box they were struggling to match the old ones.

Since I have an important shoot coming up on Memorial Day I decided it 
was time to get rid of the trouble and buy some Alien Bees triggers. 
They are relatively inexpensive (relative to Pocket Wizards), made by a 
company I trust but haven't been on the market for very long and don't 
have much of a track record yet.

So far I'm quite pleased.  They seem quite sturdily built and are very 
easy to operate.  The transmitter can be put into a hot shoe or else 
connected to a PC socket via the included cable.  The receivers come 
with three cables to connect via either a PC socket, a 3.5mm mono plug 
or a 1/4" mono plug.  The transmitter has no user operated external 
controls other than a channel number selector (0-15) and a test button. 
  There is no on/off switch.  It uses a single CR2450 coin cell lithium 
battery which is the largest coin type battery I've ever seen... about 
23mm diameter by almost 5mm thick.  Battery life quoted is about two 
years whether the unit is used or not.

The receivers have a simple, finger-tip opening battery box which holds 
two AA cells, either alkaline or NiMH.  The external controls are the 
(0-15) channel selector and an on/mode button.  There is no way for the 
user to turn it off other than pulling the batteries.  It turns itself 
off automatically one hour after receiving the last stimulus.  The 
stimulus can either be the on button or the last trigger signal received 
from the transmitter.

Pressing the button once turns the unit on and it commences a slow 
flashing of its small, green LED.  Pressing it twice puts it in 
"repeater mode" and it commences to perform a triple flash and at a 
different rate.  Pressing it again takes it out of repeater mode.  When 
in repeater mode the receiver acts as a receiver/transmitter.  It will 
fire a flash if one is attached but will also retransmit the signal to 
another receiver that is further away.  The additional latency is 1/4000 
second so, as long as one is using modest, flash compatible shutter 
speeds, you'll catch both flashes.

The biggest joy of the whole set is that I don't have to worry about 
reliability or range anymore.  They are advertised as having range "up 
to" 400 feet.  I'm not sure what planet that's on.  My tests show that, 
outside in unobstructed space, one of the receivers stops firing 
reliably at about 250 feet.  The other is a bit less at about 225 feet. 
   Either range is longer than anything I've ever needed.  Indoors, I 
was able to trigger either one reliably from about 55 feet while at the 
same time passing through two plaster partition walls and three wood 
paneled doors.  It finally failed when I moved to 60 feet and added the 
third partition wall which also has the glass shower door and porcelain 
ceramic tile on one side.  I have used lights outside and in rooms 
remote from the camera in some architectural shots but these triggers 
seem up to any of my past experience.  Finally, repeater mode is 
available if more range is truly needed.

I'm a happy camper.  For $200 I've got all the function I need and which 
would have cost me $480 for Pocket Wizards.  And they don't have the 
Pocket Wizard's Achilles heel which, in my experience, is an unreliable 
slide on/off switch which sometimes just stops working.

Dr. Flash

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