Twin Off-Camera Flash?

[BadHorse]

I am thinking about getting a second off-camera speedlite and I've been trying to figure out if I should get a second 430EX III-RT or pair the one I have with a bigger 600EX II-RT.

For the most part my 430 has had enough power -- it's bright enough -- but sometimes it can't keep up if I'm shooting too fast. On paper the 600 has the same recycle time (and uses the same number of batteries) so my guess is that it just has bigger capacitors which I'm hoping means you get more shots in a row if you aren't using it at full power. My thinking is that if you're using the smaller flash to fill at low power you might run into that delay less often.

I've also noticed that people selling their used speedlites tend to have an ugly sticker on one of them to identify which one is which -- so a bigger model would make that distinction for me.

I am, however, pretty casual and never shoot with the flashes on manual; E-TTL has served me just fine and when it hasn't I just dial in an adjustment on the transmitter. I've never used multiple speedlites before so I don't know if it can be frustrating trying to balance units with different power output -- I'm expecting it's not a problem but I don't know.

I'd be glad to hear any advice you might have.

 

[Valvebounce]

Hi BadHorse.
You don’t mention which transmitter you use?
I use 2 YN600 RTII flashes with the YN-E3 controller, that easily sorts the balance out by dialing in a ratio between the flashes and yes you do get faster recycling when you are using lower power. As for which one to get, that has to be your choice, even adding another of the same power would enable you to use a lower power on each.

Cheers, Graham.

 

[BadHorse]

Hi BadHorse.
You don’t mention which transmitter you use?
I use 2 YN600 RTII flashes with the YN-E3 controller, that easily sorts the balance out by dialing in a ratio between the flashes and yes you do get faster recycling when you are using lower power. As for which one to get, that has to be your choice, even adding another of the same power would enable you to use a lower power on each..

I'm already using the Canon ST-E3-RT and it looks like it has flexible controls over the ratio. You bring up a good point though -- when running two flashes I'll probably get lower recycling time because they're running in tandem. I see there are brackets for putting a pair behind an umbrella, too.

 

[Valvebounce]

Hi BadHorse.
I have a bracket that allows 3 flashes to be mounted behind an umbrella, with 2 600’s and a 550ex (on a YN-E3-RX to make it wireless) I could cast multiple shadows of the umbrella frame!
The main thing to remember is that if you want to set a ratio you need to assign each flash to a different group, each group can have more than one flash in it, there are 5 groups and up to 15 flash units can be connected, not sure if that means you could have 2 groups with 7 flash units (and a spare!) or up to 5 groups with a maximum of 3 flashes per group?

Cheers, Graham.

I'm already using the Canon ST-E3-RT and it looks like it has flexible controls over the ratio. You bring up a good point though -- when running two flashes I'll probably get lower recycling time because they're running in tandem. I see there are brackets for putting a pair behind an umbrella, too.

 

[BadHorse]

Thanks for the tips -- the local camera shop has an open-box discount on a 430 I'm tempted by