A while back I was lucky enough to pick up a pair of old (1980s) White Lightning K10000 studio strobes.  They were old but in very good shape and worked flawlessly within their limits.  Those limits were primarily that they had only 3 power settings – Full, 2/3, and 1/3 power and they didn’t have any way to attach any light modifiers beyond an umbrella unless you taped it on.  Also WL K10s were too old to use the upcoming Radiopopper JrX system as they don’t have a port that supports power management.

Even with those limits they were good lights but I put them up on eBay and got what I paid for them.  Not a bad deal because when I bought them they came with two 13′ heavy duty air cushioned stands and high end two umbrellas which I kept.  To purchase similar stands I’d have to shell out about $75 each.

So, what did I do with my eBay booty?  I purchased a new Alien Bee B800.  Wow, this thing is sweet.  And they Just happened to be offering a “Limited Edition Flame Orange” version right now so I snapped it up!

The folks at Alien Bees describe the AB800 like this on their website:

The AlienBees B800 is a powerful, self-contained studio flash unit, producing 320 true wattseconds and 800 effective wattseconds of power, with 14,000 lumenseconds of output. The power is independently adjustable over a stepless 5 f-stop range from Full down to 1/32nd of the total power, in whole f-stop increments, and everywhere in between. This flashpower is independently adjusted on the back control panel, with a slide fader that shows marked f-stop increments. Utilizing advanced durability flash capacitors, coupled with axial-flow thermodynamics, the B800 minimizes heat build-up, has increased overall durability, and shorter flash durations.

Cool, eh?

This is my first big light and I’m excited to give it a whirl and combine it with my SB lights which will be easy when the guys at RadioPopper deliver the JrX system.  I’ll have full manual control over all my lights from the camera.  That should very handy when shooting, say basketball and I want to hang several lights and change the light power.  It will even be handy when I hang have the AB800 13′ up in the air on one of those stands I mentioned earlier.

Well, one is not enough I really want another one so I’ll be saving my pennies and hopefully I’ll be able to pick up another one soon.

I’ll also be modifying a copy of my DIY Beauty Dish to work on the AB800.  Mounting it should be simple because this light is made to accept lots of modifiers.

Stay tuned for photos from using the AB800!