Just got my RedWing boom

I just got my RedWing (www.redwingphoto.com) boom and it's pretty nice. Thoguth I'd share a little. We have a Bogen 3398B "Convertible Boom Stand" (the black version of the 3397), and really hadn't used it too much until we decided it really was past time we started using a hair light. We discovered a few things about our multipurpose and relatively cheap ($120) boom. Liike most booms, it is awkward to set up the angles of the light -- the Bogen Super Boom and Mega Boom solve this with controls down by the base. The Redwing solves part of this with its parallelogram design (though doesn't give you remote twisting). It can be quite awkward to pivot (in complete contrast to the Redwing which moves in 3 dimensions with almost no effort). It doesn't extend terribly far, especially when you add weight which necessitates moving the bar farther out -- the bigger booms do a better job at this, especially the Bogen Mega Boom with a 3 meter extension! but with a mega price to match. I found that a single Profoto Acute head and reflector was about the weight limit at max extension -- add a Photoflex half-dome and there was quite disturbing flexing in the arm. Lastly, especially wit the half-dome mounted, it was really tippy and had to have a weight bag added to keep it from toppliing over with the slightest push. This was unacceptable for putting clients under.

What I bought was a Bogen 3376 (air damped version of 3371) Cine Stand and the Red Wing boom. The $150 Cine stand is really nice -- you have to really try to topple it over -- its tip rating is much better than most of their others (only their $430 B205 stand has a better rating). Casters are supplied. It is heavy, but that's the price for a really beefy stand (66 pound load rating vs. 11 for the Bogen basic stands or 20 for the convertible boom -- neither is enough for a boom with counterweight and head + softbox). The weight doesn't matter so much in the studio since the casters make it easy to move and the boom weighs so much anyway that the stand weight is almost irrelevent. It also has a 1 1/8 female connection on the top which is perfect for boom attachments.

The Red Wing boom (RD-1200) is a parallelogram design. It's quite different from the standard boom whcih is really just a telescoping pole on a pivoting clamp. The middle socket just goes right into the 1 1/8" port on the cine stand and stays put. If you don't tighten the connection then it just rotates around as needed with very little effort. It is big as the pictures will show. But it solves my problems of (1) getting the light up high enough, (2) getting the boom out of the way of the clients and the frame (with the straight extension setup you can get the angled arm farther out of your frame), (3) sturdy and able to handle weight, (4) secure -- no tipping please! (4) easy to use -- once set up you don't lock it down but just gently push it to where you want to and it stays put.

Here are a couple snaps of it set up in my living room with the convertible stand next to it. Note the convertible only has the head+reflector so it isn't struggling with weight here. Also, I have just the standard 18" head and will probably get an extension to get the boom even farther out of the frame (that's a 10' wide background up about 8 feet on the wall).

Note in this how the softbox stays level. Moving it to this position is quite easy.

Here you can see how the softbox stays level even when moved way down, while the standard boom is obviously pointing in the wrong direction. The regular boom is a real pain to move as when you first release it it wants to slide back toward the weights, then as you move the light down it wants to slide that direction. Of course better clamps like the Bogen 123 pivoting clamp don't have this problem since they use separate clamps for pivoting and sliding. The Red Wing is, however, a piece of cake since there are no clamps or adjustments to make -- you just push it where you want it to go.

The whole studio set up with Acute2R pack to the far left. 5' Photoflex octodome and 42" umbrella being used with the halfdome on boom.