RadioPoppers in the Wild
The guys from TriCoast Photo have gotten a chance to play with the new RadioPoppers, and dropped a juicy comment in tonight just to make all of you short-range TTL'ing chumps jealous.Their comments, and a link to full post with pix, after the jump.
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From TriCoast comment:
Hey we just tested out the Radio Poppers first hand at our Wireless flash and Video light workshop in San Diego yesterday and today.
I must admit I was somewhat worried as everyone has been on this product since it seems to be to good to be true. Blending the vast control aspects of the IR of the eTTL and iTTL methods with the Pocket Wizard security of radio waves.
Well this past few days TriCoast has been one of the first group of people to really test these little guys out.
First and foremost THEY ARE REAL, nice little packages, simple to store in your camera bag and easy to "attach" to your flash units. After a very quick run down on them by Kevin King we were off shooting and well without any problems what so ever.
I used my Mark (sic) body with my 580ex on my camera as MASTER and a 580ex II as my Slave unit and all functions of eTTL along with the power adjustments from the Master flash worked without any problems. I took the first shot, the flash (which had the IR sensor taped up - covered) fired, exposing the subject with too much light. I simply lowered the flash output on the flash by a little bit, took another shot and got PERFECT exposure and image.
Radio Poppers truly gives me the best of both worlds.
Teaching wireless flash around the world this product will change my method of teaching as well as personally shooting.
So in Summary:
Radio Poppers ARE REAL
Radio Poppers WORK
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More, and lotsa pix, at the TriCoast blog.
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by David, at 2:20 AM.
30 Comments:
Dammit! I said I wasn't going to buy anything new this year and work with what I have.
Okay... enough of the TTL version... wheres the Popper Jr's... the industry killers!
-David Griffin, The Prince of Cheap (of Studiolighting.net)
Great! Now wheres the industry killer... the Radio Popper Jr's!!!?
David Griffin - A.K.A. The Prince of Cheap (of Studiolighting.net)
Hooray! Now I hope they can quickly put out the Jr. version...
I don't understand how radio poppers can allow you to use a faster flash sync shutter speed. Unless it allows you to use some feature the flas h has to overcome the moving shutter blade.
I can't wait until they open up shop and sell these poppers. I'm definitely in for a set.
Hurrah! Can't wait for these to hit the mainstream!
I can't wait to try them out for myself!! Very promising device!
David:
Does this mean you are going to start using eTTL, or will your workflow continue to be in manual mode? How will your instruction change in your courses to accommodate this new trigger?
Rick Allen
Saint Paul, MN
Yes! Can't wait.
Aw yeah!
Your PW's just became less valuable. This is the future of remote syncing.
Now, I don't know about the Nikon flashes, but the Canon stuff (specifically the Sigma knock-offs I use) allow you to use an "eTTL Manual" mode and control each "bank" (1 main on-camera, 2 slaves) manually from the main flash using the same IR control.
I don't think you'd be limited to just eTTL "Automatic" flash setting with the RadioPoppers, but could still manually control the power of the flashes from your camera on the fly.
This for me seems like it would be the PW killer. No more having to get to that flash hanging on the ceiling or in a hard to reach place to adjust it up or down.
(So, I don't think David or anyone else would be forced to use eTTL in their workflow, but would have the option along with remote access to manual control with the RadioPoppers)
No.. I don't think PW's have become less valuable.
Because despite the capabilities of the Poppers (which happen to be pretty nifty) they still cannot run in totally manual mode with flash units that aren't TTL. ie..SB24, SB26, Any Vivitar, Alien Bee's..
Photogs that are accomplishing their off camera lighting with these devices still need to use a manual radio trigger.
Unless of course these photogs are going to wait for the Jr's. Which is a whole other bag of apples..
As the popper guys say on their website, they aren't looking to oust one kind of trigger over another.. they merely want to introduce new way to do things. In the end.. it comes down to whatever works best for you.
>I don't understand how radio
>poppers can allow you to use a
>faster flash sync shutter speed.
That's because you can use the TTL Mode of the camera as the flash was mounted oncamera.
BTW: That is already possible since a couple of years when Minolta brought the Maxxum 7... even with HSS.
Look here:
http://www.friedmanarchives.com/flash.htm
Anyway... it's still awesome what the radiopopper crew produced-
My highest respect!!
This is great i'm so excited about these.
I just hope that they already paid to use United States Patent 4864647: Wireless infrared remote control extender...
I'm excited about these too. However, the Radio Popper Jr catches my eye. For those of us that have older strobes such as the SB-26, I think the Jr is just as exciting, if only from a pure price point: ~$25 bucks. Hopefully they work as advertised.
http://radiopopper.com/model_jr.php
And I believe I saw them being ready sometime in May of this year.
Hey, Anonymous-
I think they miiiiight have checked into that before going into production. Do you think?
Signed,
Arbitrarily Anonymous, too.
Interesting observation about the patent. I have one of those remote control extenders which is essentially what the RadioPopper is. I don't really understand patent's very much but it looks like that patent covers the product.
Hopefully they looked into that.
These look like clunky junk.
:/
Pentax support? I believe there was some talk about it coming after the Canon/Nikon compatible models.
Hi David,
We're going to do a meetup in Nashville on March 29th at Vanderbilt University. Details in the Flickr discussion area.
Brian
To Anonymous re the noted patent....
Patents are good for 20 years from the filing date. That patent then expired on December 18, 2007. Convenient timing if you ask me. lol.
Perhaps I confuse the capabilities of Nikon's CLS with those of RadioPoppers. One CLS capability I like a lot is the ability to manually set my flashes from my camera, the settings communicated to the remote strobes via CLS eTTL. In essence, I am still doing manual lighting levels, but using the convenience of not having to bother the strobes/stands once set up.
David, can you tell me whether Poppers will have the same ability?
Rick
Well we in the 3rd world over here just can't afford Pocket Wizards! Plus the extension of CLS is great..
Still waiting for the Jr's though and to see how much they cost + international shipping.
The Ebay/Cactus are just too unreliable to do anything series and PW are too expensive!
Thanks David for the head up in this one, it is funny how all the people decided last year to say the product was vaporware, then they said it wouldn't work ever, then they said the photos where done with photoshop, ad infinitum...
They seem to be doing much, much, much better than the "open source radio triggers" which many of the members of the project were the first ones to jump to the conclusion that Radio Poppers were only vaporware =P .... or that poppers were going to be POS without any actual proof.
Can't wait to check out the Popper JR.
=Jay from Maryland
Hey thanks for the post oh Strobist God :)
Alright these little Radio Poppers (smaller than PW by the way) are very easy to "install" and easy to use. Kevin really has thought about everything it seems with these little guys.
We are in the process of posting more photos on our FlickR site right now to hopefully show you they are REAL and they WORK and more images to show you the actual size of them.
Again we (TriCoast) will be travelling around the country in the next few months with one pair of the Radio Poppers so if you are one that is still on the block of "they are not real" come out and see for yourself. I am not making a dime from Kevin on these, I am just one to loves to teach wireless eTTL and iTTL flash for years now and the one limitation it gave me now is solved with the Radio Poppers. Needless to say I am very excited now trying them out first hand.
-- Mike @ TriCoastPhoto.com
I was at the TriCoast workshop and saw the RadioPoppers work first hand. They are not vaporware and they really do work.
You can use manual and not ETTL/iTTL in the same way that you can use manual with the Canon/Nikon systems without Radiopoppers.
Kevin said that they sorted out all the patent issues already.
Radiopoppers look great and will definitely revolutionize how we think of off camera flash!
Feb 26 Posting on radiopopper.com:
http://www.radiopopper.com/blog/?p=22
FCC Approval Obtained! They are now waiting for the paperwork to be completed to assing them an FCC ID number (2-5 weeks they report).
Suspect pre-orders will start soon, once they can give an accurate ship date. (That's what I would do if I were running the company, as to avoid ticking people off when there are unexpected delays @ the FCC, etc.)
Obviously, they can't start mass-producing them until they have the FCC ID, since the ID number must be on each device (casing or board or whatever).
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