AlienBees VagaBond Mini In House!

Just received the brand new AlienBees Vagabond Mini Lithium Power Pack.  WOW!!  For a few years now I've been lugging around the beast (Vagabond II) which weighs in at a whopping 18.6 lbs.  The new mini is just 3.5lbs!

My back say's, "thank you", my chiropractor say's "NOOO!!"  The crazy thing? This power pack shoots almost as many shots per charge as the huge Vagabond II, and is about 1/4 of the size and weighs about 75% less.  I'll have a more in depth review coming soon, but I can tell you now that this is a HUGE change for the better for me.  Now I won't have an excuse to leave my Bee's at home.  Also, it makes NO SOUND when it charges.  For users of the older II, the annoying whine is gone with this.  It also generally does not make a sound when shooting until it's been fired a lot or if it's hot outside.  SWEET!  And no, alienbees has not paid me for this, I only blog about what I truly believe in.

BTW... It's backordered, and if history repeats itself, will probably be backordered for several months.  I'd still say to get on the order list on the off chance that they were more prepared for this unit than the Einstein flash heads......

The art of delicate light balance

This is the shot that I took 2nd place in the Teva Mountain Games with.  My lovely assistant/girlfriend (Kelly) helped carry my 18.6 pound alienbee battery pack and flash head halfway up Vail mountain.  I highly recommend getting an assistant of your own (especially if they don't charge....)

Senior Portraits, Moving to a new place, running business, sales.... soo much to do so little time!

(Note: ALL IMAGES ARE UNEDITED AND NOT RETOUCHED AS OF NOW)

I Know that my posts have been lacking lately.... but I will tell myself right now that it is OK because I am so busy.   Saying that will at least let me sleep tonight (can't disappoint my fans!).  The last two nights I've been shooting a couple of senior portraits.  When I went out to capture these shots, I decided that I wanted some traditional, and some very unique shots.  My results are posted above.  Going out to shoot, there was no set location, and we drove to places I believed might be good at this time.  Normally, I like to have gone out and scouted everything in advance, but this is not a perfect world....  I used my Alienbees B1600 lights, a 32"x40" softbox, and some lastolite trigrip diffusers and reflectors.  If the sun was shining on the subjects face, I would place the softbox to the side that needed the largest boost.  This is known as fill light, and helps even the lighting and get rid of harsh shadows.  I would get more into the technical details, but I will save that until I have more time!  Look for more posts on this subject soon and enjoy these shots.  Any comments or feedback is greatly appreciated and can be posted by clicking the link at the bottom of this post.  Now it's time for me to get back to packing, and editing!