I recently ordered a pair of Dynalite Baja B4 strobes for my sports work after seeing a write up on sportsshooter.com. I photograph a lot of high school events, and the dim conditions require flash. One problem with high school gyms, however, is that power outlets are often few and far between. This means that traditional strobes requiring AC outlets are problematic to use. In the past, I have used either Quantum flashes or Canon 600 EXRT’s mounted to gym railings to illuminate one half the court. I had limited success with theses flashes. Small strobes don’t pack a lot of power and their recycle times can be very slow. I bought lithium battery packs to reduce the recycle time but even then, results were mixed.
So when Dynalite announced their new battery-popowered strobe, I was intrigued. The Baja B4 units are feature-packed for the price. A two strobe kit can be purchased which comes with case (a large padded shoulder bag), remotes, and a transmitter. The strobe itself is 400 W/S which is plenty of power for most high school gyms. It has a 7 stop power mode or a T mode. T mode has slightly reduced power at each setting but is supposed to have much reduced recycle time, and more importantly, much shorter flash durations. The unit also has a C-mode for stroboscopic flash which can fire 5, 10, or 15 flash bursts. The Baja B4 lights have the same mounting configuration for accessories as Bowens S mount, so many standard reflectors and speed rings will fit the flashes. I also purchased 2 Dynalite telephoto reflectors to focus the light better (These are quite large and don’t fit in the supplied Tenba case).
I set up the Dynalites on the gym railings using Superclamps and Manfrotto extension arms. I was a little worried about the sturdiness of this setup but it did hold the lights to the railings without issue. I did attach a safety cable to the set up.
I shot the game using T-mode on T4 and T3 settings (I preferred T4 since the power output was greater). Flash recycle time seemed to be around 1.5 seconds. The flash duration was also short enough to stop the action on most shots. The transmitter seemed to work well, although I noticed if I didn’t fire a shot for a minute or two, I would occasionally miss the first shot of my next sequence. There may be a power off setting I am unaware of, so I will have to troubleshoot this. The channel setting on the remote and receivers is a manual/analog dial so I had to be sure this wash;t bumped between setups. Otherwise, the system worked very well.
I measured the recycle time of the flashes rather unscientifically using a stop watch. Here are the times I measured in each of the 7 T modes.
T7 4 secs
T6 3.75 secs
T5 2.25 secs
T4 1.5 secs
T3 .95 secs
T2 .75 secs
T1 .5 sec
