With our first baby on the way, and a niece and nephew both under 6 months old, decided to get some off-camera flash gear for baby and family portraits mostly. It's something I've had on my "wish list" for nearly 2 years, but haven't been able to justify it to myself until now.
So now I can have 3 remotely triggered flashes on stands. I decided on Westcott 43" umbrellas instead of a softbox. They're reversible, so can use them as a reflector or shoot-through softbox type effect.
I already had a Canon 580EXII and a 430EX. I'll be selling the latter. Got 2 new
Lumopro LP120 manual flashes. They don't do E-TTL, so you have to set the power manually. Been practising this a little with my 580 recently to get used to it. These flashes were specifically designed by and for the
Strobist community.
For triggers, I've had CyberSyncs for a while, but haven't used them really. I bought them while they still sold them to Australia. Apparently they don't any more. There are more options now, with several remote E-TTL triggers on the market. But I'll stick with the CyberSyncs. I like the reliability and guaranteed light that manual flash will give over E-TTL's variable output.
Can you tell I'm excited? This purchase has been over a year in the planning, researching, drooling, and saving. I'll post some piccies when I get a chance. Maybe on the weekend.