Thanks for the awesome post George. I think I should add that, for now at least, I am just shooting in a terribly light gym. I've progressed over one year from not being able to shoot at all in the gym to getting okay shot. This year I'm looking for great shots.








My first attempts at indoor sports with available light in a different decently light gym with a slow lens (Canon 28-135 3.5-5.6)


First attempt in the terrible gym but I bought a 430 ex II that I had mounted directly on the camera. Notice the ambient is more than 2 stops below of what I had the flash at. Also note the long shadows on the wall.





Finally I bought a 580 ex II to mount on camera at a lower power setting to reduce large shadows on the back wall and commanded the 430 ex II of camera left for some rim/separation light. (disregard the poor focus). Again notice how terrible the ambient light is. I have a 40d and I'd really like to not put the iso above 800 as it gets pretty noisy for my taste.





This season I'm hoping to get two flashes off camera for more mobility and add some gels to the flashes for color temperature.


After consideration of the posts here I've decided to just use my 430 and 580 with 3 pocketwizard plus II units and then sell the 430 and replace it with another 580 when I have more money.


So I would be spending $576.80 now and then $200 (net) to replace the 430 later.


Of course for my setup I will need 2 umbrella stand adapters and bogen superclamps as well as some gaffers tape and some ball bungees if I can't clamp onto anything in there.