Toronto Photography Meetup Group

I'm trying to decide.. Which one would you get? Why?

Neither, I think these devices produce ugly, flat lighting.

For the heck of it I went to the Orbis site and while they proclaim it producing "Beautiful, shadowless lighting", the images they show on their site are hot, and have very ugly catchlights. Another thing they claim, "Changing the face of portrait photography"...I can agree with that, but not for the better!

Also with the Orbis (from what I saw on the website) you have to hold it with your hand...one issue is now you have all the camera's weight in one hand (unless you get the "Orbis arm" but that's for a light stand). Second, many flashes don't provide a lot of electrical insulation around the head...when test firing them in my hand I have gotten electrical jolts through the plastic...if yours isn't well insulated and you get a jolt, you may drop the flash, and in reaction drop your camera too!

As for the Ray Ring, that's a lot of weight to be putting on the hot shoe/foot combination...people break their flash feet without the added weight of this product...can't see it being good for it!

I used to own the Orbis when it first came out, back then they didn't have the arm attachment (I haven't checked, is it available now?). In a word, it was cumbersome! I was able to hang the Orbis and flash from the lens and "lock" it into position with the lens hood, but this situation didn't instil lot of confidence. I also didn't like losing about 1 to 1.5 stops and the catchlight wasn't completely round (small bump at the bottom).

However, for portability you can't beat it. After a short time I sold it to a friend and bought myself an ABR800.

I have the ABR800 as well, really nice unit. Not exactly the most solidly built ringflash but on the other hand, it costs a third of what the equivalent "big name" unit would. It's made mostly of plastic, which makes it much easier to truck around. Don't get me wrong, it's still awkward but, combined with the Vagabond II powerpack and a good tripod, it's an extremely portable little system. You just can't bang it around too much. And why would you?

mikefellh - the things you criticize about the images you've seen taken with a ringflash are pretty much the look that people are going for. Some people like it - it's a retro look, early-80's Vogue magazine cover styles - given that this is a thread by someone who wants to buy one for that purpose, your comment is completely off-topic and not helpful.

Thank you for everyone's responses.

The alien bee setup is good but it'll set me back a bit. Looks like I'll probably be getting the Orbis setup (with the arm). Does anyone have experience using the entire setup without a tripod? Heavy? I'll be covering events and won't be able to carry a tripod with me.

The Orbis barely weighs anything. The arm weighs about as much since it is made of aluminum. The bulk of the weight will be your existing gear and the particular lens that you use. What will be different is the centre of gravity will be moved forward because of where the flash has been relocated.

Covering an event using a ring flash? As in a crime scene event?

haha yeahh CSI style!