J. Lane Dry Plates and Flash

[faberryman]

J. Lane Dry Plates have an ISO of 2 meaning portraits using ambient light are problematic. Does anyone have any experience with using dry plates with studio flash?

[Tin Can]

Yes

[Two23]

Use a flash meter set to iso2. It will take a lot of flash power I would think.

[faberryman]

I'll see if my flash is powerful enough. My LF lenses are only f5.6. Any short duration reciprocity?

[Nodda Duma]

Recently I was invited to teach a session at the NH Institute of Art on shooting dry plate, and the class was set up for studio portraiture using a strobe. I'm not an indoor shooter, so the instructor handled that... I was there to show them how they're made and how to develop the plates. I believe they used 2400 or 4800 W/s strobe and set the aperture for ISO 1. They would trip the shutter, pop the strobe, then close the shutter. We then developed the plates by inspection. That worked well. Just make sure you take off any UV filters.

Personally, I've used old school flash bulbs with success. You just have to extrapolate the guide number down to ASA 2. I've actually done that extrapolation in excel for data on a bunch of different flashbulb types and manufacturers. I plan to post that to the website some time.


I'm sure the plates have some short duration reciprocity failure, but I haven't characterized it and as mentioned I've seen strobe flash used successfully.

Cheers,
Jason

[faberryman]

I believe they used 2400 or 4800 W/s strobe and set the aperture for ISO 1.
Thanks for responding. I don't have anything near that powerful. The units I have access to top out at 640 Ws. Hopefully they weren't using them at full power.

[Nodda Duma]

Thanks for responding. I don't have anything near that powerful. The units I have access to top out at 640 Ws. Hopefully they weren't using them at full power.

If it helps, it was just a single strobe I *think* shot at 1200. Sorry, I just wasn’t paying close attention. I know the photog uses that amount in his own studio.

Regards,
Jason

[Two23]

I have 10,000ws, might try in a week or two.


Kent in SD

[B.S.Kumar]

Thanks for responding. I don't have anything near that powerful. The units I have access to top out at 640 Ws. Hopefully they weren't using them at full power.

If you're doing still life, you can always do multiple pops.

Kumar

[Peter De Smidt]

If you're photographing people with high flash power, make sure to have the ambient light very high. That will close down their pupils and make the flash more bearable. With all the flash power, the ambient won't matter for the photo.

[Jason Greenberg Motamedi]

I just tried my first plate using strobe, and it worked fine. I had two Speedotron heads (2400ws not uv-coated with a 22" dish & 1200ws uv-coated with a 16" reflector and diffuser) about four feet from the subject at f11. The exposure looks spot on.

[Peter De Smidt]

Good to know, as is the reminder about the non-uv heads. I really need to get some plate holders.

[Tin Can]

PM me with what you want.


Good to know, as is the reminder about the non-uv heads. I really need to get some plate holders.

[faberryman]

I tried it with a speedlight and umbrella and got f5.6 at 200 ISO, so I'm seven stops short of light with that setup. I'll try it without the umbrella, before bringing out the 640Ws monolights.

[Two23]

I tried it with a speedlight and umbrella and got f5.6 at 200 ISO, so I'm seven stops short of light with that setup. I'll try it without the umbrella, before bringing out the 640Ws monolights.


The little 4AA flash will never do it. I once tried with x2 Buff Bees B1600 and large soft boxes and didn't get enough light at portrait distance.


Kent in SD

[Jason Greenberg Motamedi]

Good to know, as is the reminder about the non-uv heads...

I am not convinced that the uv coating makes any significant difference. I have both coated and uncoated strobes, and have never been able to detect a difference with other color-blind or orthochromatic processes. That said, you are going to need at least 1200ws to use strobes at f5.6 at 2 ISO close to the subject with modest diffusion, and at least twice that to use umbrellas. My experience is that a beauty dish provides the greatest (and to my eye most pleasing) diffusion with the least amount of light loss.

[Peter De Smidt]

Good to know, Jason. I've got about 10K ws available.

[Nodda Duma]

Good to know, Jason. I've got about 10K ws available.

That should do it lol

I’d add a stop speed for pre-batch 37 plates. Previous batches ran a bit slow (annoyingly).

[faberryman]

The little 4AA flash will never do it. I once tried with x2 Buff Bees B1600 and large soft boxes and didn't get enough light at portrait distance.This doesn't appear doable without making a significant equipment investment. Alien Bees B1600 are the most powerful flashes I have access too.