The Godox Revolution — Damian Tan Photography

I’ve pretty much used camera manufacture’s own speedlite since I’ve started shooting. If I need to use speedlites off camera, I’ll need to use Pocketwizard Flex TT1, AC3 Zone Controller and TT5s. (OK, I am a Nikon user) Anything more powerful, the Profoto Acute B2 600 AirS.

As technology moves forward, many companies had integrated radio capabilities into their flashes. (Great, don’t need Pocketwizards anymore. Damn it cost me 1k+ SGD back then) I believe Canon was the 1st for speedlites with their RT series. Nikon did release their own version, the SB5000 but with a big catch. In order to use the radio capability you have to buy 2 more additional piece of “dongle” (Sounds like Apple), which I think is ridiculous.

Early in the year, some of my speedlites started giving me problems; it was high time to look for upgrades. Godox pretty much rocked the strobist world the last 2 to 3 years with a series of radio integrated flashes and triggers so naturally I looked at their direction.

After a bit of research I believe Godox can replaced my entire lighting system seamlessly. Below are some of the criteria.

Radio (2.4G X system) integration
TTL
HSS/HS/Hyper Sync What ever they are called; as long as the flash can go above the camera’s max flash sync speed and even up to 1/8000 sec.
Portability & easy of use (No more cables, receivers, battery packs; just 1 transmitter and the flashes. Less setup time)
Li-ion batteries
Price (It is about 1/3 the price of any similar product from branded manufacturer)

To start off, I got two V860II speedlites and the Xpro trigger.

Putting Li-ion battery into speedlites (V860II)

It’s about time someone does that moreover it’s their version II already. Though there may be some pro and cons went you look at this. You can always buy AA batteries in an emergency situation is one. But having longer battery life and recycle speed outweigh that. Rated at 650 full power pops at a single charged. You can easily shoot an entire day with just 1 Li-ion battery.

Recycle time at Full power

V860II - 1.7 Sec
SB900 with eneloop pro rechargeable AA batteries - 2.8 sec
SB900 plus Godox Propac PB 960 - 1.2 sec

TTL test (There is no TTL BL, just iTTL), I find that in general a -1 flash compensation is a good staring point in most cases. Burst a bit, at times there maybe some slight flash output inconsistencies. In manual, everything is fine as it should be. The recycle is fast enough but can’t compare to flash connected with an external battery pack. (You can’t connect the V860II with external battery pack) If you like to gun your subjects perhaps the TT685 connected to a Propac PB 960 is a better option. As for me, the most I double shot or at times a max of 3 continuous frame; losing those AA batteries and irritating cables from the PB 960 is my priority.

Configuring Master and slave on the V860II is straight forward. Press the Z looking button on the extreme right. 1st you will have the optical options then the radio. The master will be in green screen while as slave the screen will be in orange.

One thing I don’t really like about the V860II is there is no locking for the twist and turn of the head like the Nikon’s. You can easily bump them off position.

Xpro trigger

I must say it is the most intuitive trigger out there. Better than the Profoto Air remote. The large screen enable you to see all your group flash power and modes. Dedicated group buttons makes changing individual group power setting so much easier and clearer. Power increments can be done in 128 power or 256. TCM function enable you to do a test shot with TTL and convert into manual mode and do the necessary small increments.

You can do 1/10 power increments with the latest software update but the annoying thing about Godox is software updates are currently on PCs only. Hello Godox, get someone to write a damn dmg file!

As of writing, the radio system experience and reliability has been good so far.

One thing I do like about the trigger this the ALL function. You can select all (Groups) and do a global power increase or decrease.

There is a AF assist lamp. My feeling on this is a bit mixed. On one hand it is good thing have but I am not sure if it is helping in auto focus. I do find that it actually slows down the AF speed of the camera quite a bit. Whether it is more accurate or not, I’ve yet to test but most of the time I just turn the AF assist off.

Another interesting thing is, as I use rechargeable AA batteries, the battery indicator (3 levels of indication), will never be on level 3 even when the batteries had been fully charged. The most it will show is level 2. I did a shoot once with batteries that I’ve charged a week ago and it only showed level 1 but it went through the day just fine. So…

AD400pro

I’ve just bought the AD400pro recently. I went for the AD400pro instead of the AD600pro mainly because of portability and weight. The extra 200Ws sounds good but honestly you’ll rarely need it. (Don’t recall I went over 1/2 power that often with my 600Ws B2)

The main reason why I considered Godox strobe is the improved colour consistency of their pro series. Rivalling big brands like Profoto and Broncolor. Of course, the big boys offers superior build quality and customer support. You can also rent their stuff anyway in the world. They also have shorter flash duration with colour consistency. Not to be confused by HSS/HS/Hyper Sync. A shorter flash duration (t.1) is what you need if you are the type of photographer that likes to throw water, sand, powder and etc on your subject. It’s the short flash duration of the strobe that freeze the motion.

I am not sure how accurate the t.1 indicator on the AD400pro is but an example at 1/8 power the t.1 is 1/2770 sec but in colour mode it is only 1/1850 sec so there is a trade off.

Recycle time is pretty decent at about 1.3 sec at full power. Rated at 390 full power pops on a single charged. It is also TTL and HSS capable.

The AD400pro by default is in their own Godox mount but it does come with a Bowens mount adapter ring that you can screw in. You can even buy adapters for other brand mount like Elinchrom, Profoto and even Broncolor. Anyway, just stick to Bowens compatible modifiers. They are much cheaper with plenty of options.

There is a 30W LED modeling lamp. Good to have during the night to help AF or indoors situation but useless in the day, outdoors. The internal fan does kick in quite fast when you have the LED turned on.

Lastly, reminder Godox get someone to write dmg for Mac users! My Xpro trigger can’t do 1/10 increments and TCM with AD400pro.

Final Thoughts

I believe at this point, Godox provides the greatest value for the kind of lighting equipments solution I need. It is perfect? Nope. But for the price and performance, it’s a no brainer.