Is it Christmas already?

Like a small boy at on Christmas Eve, i couldn't get to sleep lastnight as i knew today would be the day i would receive my Inon Ringflash. I had been tracking it's progress on an hourly basis for the last few days and knew that today would be the day!

I first tried to buy one of these almost 7 years ago now, and having been mocked by the staff at Ocean Optics for asking if it would fit on an Ikelite housing back in the early naughties (due to the possible melting of the housing!? I know better now!). I coveted this strobe for 6 years, like a stalker, every time we had a photographer from Asia on a charter i would peer into their kit bag from afar, hoping to catch a glimpse of this mystical ringflash. Alas, not one was seen on my travels and i feared all hope of me getting one of these strobes was dead, built to order and only doing ttl with film!? Surely they wouldn't continue to make them...

Then one afternoon whilst slacking off in my old job i caught a glimpse of an 'INON Z22' the picture looked like the INON Ringlash i'd seen on the other sites, and no one would laugh at me for trying to put it on my Nexus D200, would they? Fortunately not!

I awoke at about 5:45am this morning dreaming of this feat of underwater engineering, would it be sturdy or would if be full of rattles and loose parts like my land based ringflash? Would i become one of those sacrilegious Inon converts who stop suckling on the customer service teat of Ikelite and nuzzle gently against the reliable bosom of these AA eating beasts?

I managed to get myself to doze off again, and awoke at a 7:00, i knew today was going to be torture waiting for my new toy to arrive! Fortunately, i did not have to wait too long, at precisely 10.02am Santa arrived in his big red van to spread the joy at this special time...

Unwrapping my parcel with glee i found all the bits i was looking for... A shiny new Ringflash and a magnificent magnifying dioptre.

The build quality is fantastic, all the little knobs have a satisfying clunk when turned, and the dioptre is wonderfully made.

Here is a photo of my new beau surrounded by her jealous rivals:

There is only one thing that Santa forgot.... and that is instructions in a language i can read! I don't suppose anyone who uses one of these can tell me how to turn on the focus light, or for that matter what the small rubber lump, cap and oring are for!?

Simon (with far too much time on his hands)

Congrats on the new arrival, Simon.

Quite a few Brits I know have them. I actually fixed one with a ring-pull on my Bali trip last year. I would love to get one - but I don't think that they will fit the new Nikon 105mm VR?

To add to the Christmas feel - I got my Tokina 10-17mm this morning. I was waiting until we had a trade show in town, when I could save a few squid. It is definitely the ugliest lens I have ever owned - but luckily I can't see it in the housing!

Alex

Hi Simon,

Don't forget to put the pretty stickers on your new toy, because they, my friend, are the only thing written in English that you are likely to find out about this strobe...How it works and what you do with the different caps etc., is a very closely guarded Inon secret.

I have asked, and they won't tell me!...so if you can find anything in English, please pass it along...

BTW...just wait until you see the backscatter that these things are capable off...

Bruce

BTW...just wait until you see the backscatter that these things are capable off...

Hehe,

will all my pictures now have that Christmassy 'snowy' look to them?!? How wonderful!

Congrats on the new arrival, Simon.

 

Quite a few Brits I know have them. I actually fixed one with a ring-pull on my Bali trip last year. I would love to get one - but I don't think that they will fit the new Nikon 105mm VR?

 

To add to the Christmas feel - I got my Tokina 10-17mm this morning. I was waiting until we had a trade show in town, when I could save a few squid. It is definitely the ugliest lens I have ever owned - but luckily I can't see it in the housing!

 

Alex

I bet the guy who made the custom subal port for the 105AFD could make one for the VR, in fact, i think the Nexus VR port can accommodate this flash.

Yeah, the Tokina is an ugly thing... But it will be great for your shark trip in July... In fact... Why didn't you pick one up over there!?

congratulation for your new toy and thanks for that nice story, that remembered me of my inon parcel ...

i might know someone with an english user manual:

manfred from www.unterwasserkamera.at in austria had all the inon manuals translated in german and - as far as i know - also in english.

maybe ask him.

greets, serge

Yeah, the Tokina is an ugly thing... But it will be great for your shark trip in July... In fact... Why didn't you pick one up over there!?

I need it before then! Plus I am a big believer in supporting my local dealer. And I need to practise with it!

Alex

Hi All,

There is an instructions pdf for the Z-22 Quad/ringflash on the Inon America website at the bottom of the page.

http://www.inonamerica.com/products.php?pr...=1&subcat=2

Hope it helps!

Pete

Hi All,

There is an instructions pdf for the Z-22 Quad/ringflash on the Inon America website at the bottom of the page.

 

http://www.inonamerica.com/products.php?pr...=1&subcat=2

 

Hope it helps!

 

Pete

Thank you!

I now have my modelling light working! I dont think it works automatically with DSlr's though, but it' still great. I cant wait to use it with some teleconverters as the power output is huge!

Alex, i'm totally lost on this comment... I actually fixed one with a ring-pull on my Bali trip last year....

I couldnt resist trying out the doublet dioptre so heres a sample image:

This doublet definitely gives me way more DOF than my woody's dioptre. Not that this image is a good example. But at 8.5mm across i make it 2.7:1 in terms of digital chips, and in old fashioned money on 35mm film an 8.5mm image would have been just over 4:1. I may try doubling up the teleconverters and getting a step up ring for my 6T.

Will sink like a block of lead though, i better start working out!

When it gets warmer i may take it for a dip in the dyke down the road, from my childhood i remember there being all kinds of lice living in there.

Alex, i'm totally lost on this comment... I actually fixed one with a ring-pull on my Bali trip last year....

It had an intermittant fault, that I traced to the battery compartment and then used a ringpull to wedge a solid connection!

i may take it for a dip in the dyke down the road...

Enjoy you dip in the dyke.

Alex

HI SI,

just tell me ware the PARCEL FORCE van fits to your rig

& was it driven by Father Christmas???? Did he have my D200

housing in the back?? I throught he could only drive/fly a sleigh

but how things change, he must be moving with the times

Andy

Enjoy you dip in the dyke.

do these huge things on the end of a lense actually work ?

I mean i know they light up the subject .. but don't they help scare it off .. and backscatter like mentioned ?

That just sounds bad !

 

do these huge things on the end of a lens actually work ?

 

I mean i know they light up the subject .. but don't they help scare it off .. and backscatter like mentioned ?

It's not actually that big, only a touch bigger than my SS200, about 6.5 inches in diameter si im hoping it will be less obtrusive than dual strobes.

Backscatter is a pain with dual strobes too for macro past 1:1 which was my primary reason for buying it., i'll find out in May!

Plus it looks really really cool......

looks like its not spring yet...

no leaves on the trees eh?

Glad i don't live there...

Mike...

I wasn't actually sat in the bushes with my camera waiting for the mail man. In England that would probably get you arrested. I guess thats what you do in your free time in Yap?!?

Free stock photo.... we had sunshine today, and yesterday i was working outside topless! Building up my tan!

Looking like a typical British builder with my gut hanging over the front and my arse cheeks poking out of the back!

Free stock photo.... we had sunshine today, and yesterday i was working outside topless! Building up my tan!

Looking like a typical British builder with my gut hanging over the front and my arse cheeks poking out of the back!

Congrats on the ringflash, Simon, but you're frightening me with all these references to mullets, fat asses, hanging guts, arse cheeks and dipping into dykes fraught with lice!

I'm going to have to seek counseling for extreme trauma to the imagination now.

Nice story there Simon...LUV the Red Van pic

Contgrats

That's a wild setup....

Okay laugh at me if you must but...

I take it you have this on the end of your housing and it lights up the end to shoot macro instead of a strobe.

Are the lights always on or do they flash like a strobe?

Ok,

firstly some clarification of my use of the word Dyke:

–noun

1. an embankment for controlling or holding back the waters of the sea or a river: They built a temporary dike of sandbags to keep the river from flooding the town.

2. a ditch.

3. a bank of earth formed of material being excavated.

4. a causeway.

5. British Dialect. a low wall or fence, esp. of earth or stone, for dividing or enclosing land.

6. an obstacle; barrier.

7. Geology.

a. a long, narrow, cross-cutting mass of igneous rock intruded into a fissure in older rock.

b. a similar mass of rock composed of other kinds of material, as sandstone.

8. Chiefly Australian Slang. a urinal.

–verb (used with object)

9. to furnish or drain with a dike.

10. to enclose, restrain, or protect by a dike: to dike a tract of land.

I'm just glad i didnt say i was going to lie down on the side and put my head in the dyke (which is highly likely) to take some pictures....

Where the Aussies get their slang from amazes me (refer to number 8)....

Next, the size of the Rig intimidating fish life, i had to take some snaps of the D70 rig to try to sell it so i set it up with a traditional flash setup:

You can see that even without the fact that the arms are all over the place it's a lot smaller. My principle thoughts are when trying to photograph critters hidden in fans etc this will be much less intrusive, and considerably less likely to catch on anything.

Wags:

From this next one you can see the 4 individual flash tubes, its not really a true ringflash. The fifth, round one is a focussing light.

It sure is good to know that I'm not the only adult that sits and waits for $1000 toys like it's xmas and tracks a package like I'm flying a stealth fighter. It just left the depot. It's in Texas. It left Texas. It's on a plane. It's in my town. It's on a truck. Hope nobody hits the truck. My ND20 is coming and I can't wait!

Andy

It sure is good to know that I'm not the only adult that sits and waits for $1000 toys like it's xmas and tracks a package like I'm flying a stealth fighter. It just left the depot. It's in Texas. It left Texas. It's on a plane. It's in my town. It's on a truck. Hope nobody hits the truck. My ND20 is coming and I can't wait!

 

Andy

I'm certainly as guilty as the next person of tracking my packages obsessively. Funny that you mention Texas, though. It always seems to take forever for my packages to get from that UPS depot in Mesquite, Texas, to me in Houston. Imagine how frustrating it was when my 5D finally made it to Houston, only to have the delivery truck miss me three days in a row! I ended up begging UPS to hold the package for me at their distribution center here in town and then spent the better part of a workday wandering around lost in an unfamiliar part of town. You'd think that the UPS distribution center that serves the 4th largest city in the country would be a pretty obvious place to find... When they finally located the box in the back of their warehouse, I didn't even wait to get back to my car to open it up and take a look at my new toy! Yup, I tore that package open right there in the middle of their lobby.

Ok,

 

firstly some clarification of my use of the word Dyke:

I'm just glad i didnt say i was going to lie down on the side and put my head in the dyke (which is highly likely) to take some pictures....

 

 

 

Simon ..Simon, and I was just getting to appreciate your posts....

 

You edited out definition 11...

 

Dyke (1) (noun)

 

Dyke or dike

 

A taboo term for a lesbian

 

("all kinds of lice living in there" convinced me

 

 

ps: do you plan on posting "head in the dyke" photies