flash for deep stack

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metebalci
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flash for deep stack

Post by metebalci »

Hello,

I am using Godox V1 when I use a flash, and it is usually around 1/16 power. I am triggering it optically using a small flash on the camera hot shoe, it is pretty close so nothing blocking the optical sight. The normal recycle time of the flash in its spec. is 1.5s, and I am using 500ms ON, 1000ms OFF time in stackshot, so I think I give plenty of time to recycle at this low power. However, particularly in stacks > 200 frames, I see some black frames (usually alternating and starting after the first 100 or 200 frames, one image one black, or something close to that). Do you think it is because of thermal shutdown in the flash or due to something else ? What do you use or recommend for such stacks > 200 frames, up to lets say 1000 ?

Mete

JKT
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Post by JKT »

Why don't you try another stack with longer delay between images? Whether that affects the number and occurrence of black frames or not, you'll still have more information to pinpoint the problem.

Pau
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Post by Pau »

I am triggering it optically using a small flash on the camera hot shoe....
Maybe the guilty is this small unit, have you tried to fire the main unit by wire?
Pau

Adalbert
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Post by Adalbert »

Hello Mete,
I create often stacks based on 700 – 800 single shots
but every time with the 1/128 power of the flashes
and 7 seconds break for the loading of the batteries.
My 4 flashes YN660 are triggered wireless by theRF605.
I haven’t noticed any problem up to now :-)
BR, ADi

metebalci
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Post by metebalci »

I did a test today and also I realized this is mentioned in the manual as over-temperature protection which increases the recycling time. So it is activated after 300 consecutive flashes at 1/16 power, (and 500 at 1/32, and 1000 at 1/64-128-256). The manual says to wait 10 mins to recover from this state.

The interesting thing is I looked at various products of Godox (from small TT350 to big AD600Pro), and these numbers are exactly the same. So up to 1000, the solution is to go for a high power flash head, but how to go beyond 1000 that I do not know. I should check the products from other vendors.

Adalbert, do you pause in the middle of a series of shots ? If I am not wrong it is only possible to abort the shots with stackshot, now I think it would be a useful feature to be able to pause/resume also.

Mete

mawyatt
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Post by mawyatt »

metebalci wrote:I did a test today and also I realized this is mentioned in the manual as over-temperature protection which increases the recycling time. So it is activated after 300 consecutive flashes at 1/16 power, (and 500 at 1/32, and 1000 at 1/64-128-256). The manual says to wait 10 mins to recover from this state.

The interesting thing is I looked at various products of Godox (from small TT350 to big AD600Pro), and these numbers are exactly the same. So up to 1000, the solution is to go for a high power flash head, but how to go beyond 1000 that I do not know. I should check the products from other vendors.

Adalbert, do you pause in the middle of a series of shots ? If I am not wrong it is only possible to abort the shots with stackshot, now I think it would be a useful feature to be able to pause/resume also.

Mete
Mete,

Many reasons I abandoned speedlights for studio work many years ago, misfires, blank images, overheating, batteries and so on. I've melted a YN622 (overheat failed), burnt my hands on batteries, batteries die, and so on.

Once I found the Adorama/Godox type studio strobes I've had few problems, the Studio Strobe 300 is my go to strobe, also use the AD600 and the Rapid 600 for high speed optical bursts. Done sessions with many thousands of images without issues.

Lately looking into high power video LED (Godox SL-150) types modified for macro use, and the Jansjo LED lamps modified for higher power and strobe modes.

Best,
Research is like a treasure hunt, you don't know where to look or what you'll find!
~Mike

metebalci
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Post by metebalci »

Thanks Mike, very helpful info. I think I will also consider sth. like AD400-600.

Since you mentioned continuous light, I actually consider flash mainly because of additional effect of eliminating any vibration. I dont know how to quantify this, just for eliminating any potential vibration in a simple setup (simple in the sense no special attention to eliminate vibration, eg no extra weights or optical table, camera on stackshot rail on a tripod) max 20x magnification, what should be the maximum length of freezing moment (shutter speed or flash duration) ? Is it easy to quantify this ?

Mete

Chris S.
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Post by Chris S. »

metebalci wrote:If I am not wrong it is only possible to abort the shots with stackshot, now I think it would be a useful feature to be able to pause/resume also.
Mete, I think you're right about this behavior of the StackShot, and that it would be a useful feature for the StackShot to include a pause/resume function after n shots. Such a function could be used for cooling down a mains-powered flash, or for changing batteries in a battery-powered flash.

I no longer shoot macro stacks with flash (I now use continuous light only), but when I did use flash, I emailed the folks at Cognisys (makers of the StackShot), suggesting they add a pause/resume function just as you described here. Cognisys has excellent customer service, and their thoughtful reply was that this was a good idea that might be considered for a future firmware upgrade.

Makers of hardware or software are, of course, inundated with upgrade requests, and can't fill them all. But perhaps if you write Cognisys with this suggestion, if I repeat my prior suggestion, and if others who read this and agree write politely with the same suggestion, we could get this idea moved up higher in the "jobs to do" queue.

Again, the folks at Cognisys are, in my experience, nice people who care a lot about customer support. If we customers make it clear that a pause/restart function would help us when shooting stacks with flash, it seems more likely that this need might be addressed in a firmware update sooner rather later.

--Chris S.

JKT
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Post by JKT »

It seems to me that the pausing could also be accomplished in Zerene Stacker if that is used to control StackShot.

That reminds me that with current combination of DSLRs and mirrorless it would be nice to save and load StackShot configurations in Zerene.

mawyatt
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Post by mawyatt »

metebalci wrote:Thanks Mike, very helpful info. I think I will also consider sth. like AD400-600.

Since you mentioned continuous light, I actually consider flash mainly because of additional effect of eliminating any vibration. I dont know how to quantify this, just for eliminating any potential vibration in a simple setup (simple in the sense no special attention to eliminate vibration, eg no extra weights or optical table, camera on stackshot rail on a tripod) max 20x magnification, what should be the maximum length of freezing moment (shutter speed or flash duration) ? Is it easy to quantify this ?

Mete
Mete,

Flash can help with vibration issues, but the better approach is too try and reduce the vibration source(s) and one by one reduce the effects.

Using Stackshot on a tripod is likely to not produce good results at higher magnifications, even with flash. Very good and expensive tripods can't match the stability of a dedicated setup where the camera/lens/rail are securely held with the same common structure as the subject.

The AD600 we have are excellent strobes, the Bowens mount makes all sorts of light modifiers available.

Best
Research is like a treasure hunt, you don't know where to look or what you'll find!
~Mike

metebalci
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Post by metebalci »

mawyatt wrote: Very good and expensive tripods can't match the stability of a dedicated setup where the camera/lens/rail are securely held with the same common structure as the subject.
I should say, it is a bit confusing to think it is the best to have subject and camera on the same structure, since I guess the main source of vibration is I guess the camera movement (rail). Is it because at least the vibration affect both at the same time in the same way ?

Mete

Adalbert
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Post by Adalbert »

Hello Mike,
Flash can help with vibration issues

yes, at 1/128 of the power you get very short light-impulse (about 1/40000s)
so that no vibration can be registered during the exposure.

BR, ADi

metebalci
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Post by metebalci »

Adalbert wrote: My 4 flashes YN660
Do you use 4 flashes to keep the power at 1/128 ?

Mete

rjlittlefield
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Post by rjlittlefield »

JKT wrote:That reminds me that with current combination of DSLRs and mirrorless it would be nice to save and load StackShot configurations in Zerene.
StackShot configuration settings are managed in the same way as all the other preferences, with two exceptions:
1) in the GUI they appear in the StackShot panel instead of Options > Preferences, and
2) the StackShot panel has its own local copy of many of the configuration settings, as long as it is open.

So, the StackShot configuration settings can be explicitly saved and reloaded by closing the StackShot panel and then using the "Save preferences..." and "Load preferences..." buttons in the Options > Preferences panel

StackShot configuration settings are also stored as part of saved projects, so they are saved and reloaded by File > Save Project and File > Open Project, again as long as those operations are done while the StackShot panel is closed.

None of these mechanisms allows to save and restore the StackShot configuration separately from all the other preferences. (In general, there is no mechanism to save and restore any subsets of preferences.)

I have added this information to the StackShot page on the website.

--Rik

JKT
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Post by JKT »

That'll do nicely - thanks for the information!

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