The Pros and Cons of using Cheap China Brand Lights
Apr 10, 2015
Laya Gerlock
Laya Gerlock is a Portrait and Product photographer based in the Philippines. His passion is teaching and sharing his knowledge in Photograpy and has been doing this for 6 years.
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My first ever off-camera flash was a Nikon sb-24 speedlight (1988), which I got. After a while I bought my first ever Nikon speedlight an sb-600 (it was around $250 back then). I was very happy with it until I wanted to get a studio strobe. There weren’t many choices to pick from here in the Philippines; it’s either you get one that cost around $300 per strobe or you can buy a “kit” with 3 off brand studio lights, light stands and softboxes for around $220. I got the latter.
(As a reference, a 400WS Broncolor Siros 400 which is one fine branded strobe – yet one of the cheaper branded strobes – will set you back $1000. A Cowboystudio 400WS strobe will only cost $150. A Square Perfect 400W/S strobe will only set you back a $100 or so. Those 3 are obviously not comparable strobe)
CHEAP doesn’t always mean bad, I have used these lights for more than 6 years now, and I want to share with you the pros and cons of using cheap off brand lights.
Pros Of Using Cheap Off Branded Strobes
1. You know the saying: Light is Light; similarly a flash is a flash whatever brand it is; it will still pop a flash in the end, which gives out light.
2. They may be cheap but it does not mean they are use and throw. My first ever studio strobe lasted for over 3 years before it broke. I never had to change the flash tube, but the modeling light (peanut bulb) burned down often. Luckily, you can buy a normal peanut bulb strobe (with a lower wattage) for less than $3.
3. They come with a cheaper eco-system. A lot of the times cheaper strobes will utilize cheaper modifiers, when a branded modifier can set you back a few hundred Dollars, a 3rd party modifier is often only a few dozens.
On the flip side, they are cheap enough to feel almost disposable; so you wouldn’t feel that bad if one of those strobes breaks.
Best used for your personal home studio to practice with, see below why you don’t want to take them on a paying gig.
Did we mention cheaper? You can buy more strobes for the price of one branded light
Many of the cheap strobes will still have a built in optical slave mode, which is very useful for off-camera use. Less useful when you are not the only photographer, say at a wedding where every aunt and uncle will be popping their micro 4/3 flashes triggering your strobes leaving them unrecycled when you need them most.
Cons Of Using Cheap Off Branded Strobes
Most cons has to do with technology being behind, which kinda makes sense. It is hard to sell cheap AND keep and a good R&D department. So there are impacts:
Recycle time is slow. If you are doing still life this is not an issue, but for live action / model work this can be disturbing.
Off branded strobes are not as reliable as branded ones, so they are hard to use in a professional environment, they sometimes misfire and you want top notch performance when delivering to paying clients. 3rd party strobes will misfires significantly more than good branded strobes.
Off branded strobes are likely to overheat if not ventilated properly, you need to slow down when shooting when using cheap lights, you can’t shoot in continuous mode or else it will probably overheat. If I need shoot continuous I give it a rest for about a minute before each burst. This workflow can be very destructing for a model.
The build quality is quite cheap, one drop and it MIGHT break. Two drops… well, let’s just say that you’d better hire assistants that NEVER drop gear.
If you are doing work where color reproduction is important, you must be aware of the fact that color temperature of the flash might have some color cast. The temperature is not even consistent between two strobes from the same brand. Cheap comes at a price of lesser quality control.
You get what you pay for, that usually means only standard features. You buy a cheap studio strobe and you only get a basic studio strobe, a modeling light (sometimes), and a slave function. Forget about extra features like TTL, Stroboscopic mode, Auto dumping, short flash duration and fine tuned controls. (Horses for courses, of course, sometimes this is all that you need)
Conclusion
So, should you buy one or not? If you are just starting photography and you want a studio strobe to practice at home, I would definitely recommend getting one. 90% of my photos are done using a cheap studio strobe. And until now I still use my cheap lights for practicing photography inside my home studio. For commercial or big clients, it is worth it to buy a branded and trusted studio light.
As a footnote, I wanna talk a bit about speedlights, the picture is different there…. If you do a lot of off-camera speedlight use, you should definitely consider a cheap speedlight. You can probably buy 3-6 speedlight for a price of one branded one. And the quality is getting better every day. Many photographers now swear by their cheap Yongnuo strobes. I always tell my students to invest in one or two branded speedlight for on-camera use (TTL) and just buy cheap speedlights for off-camera use.
Laya Gerlock
Laya Gerlock is a Portrait and Product photographer based in the Philippines. His passion is teaching and sharing his knowledge in Photograpy and has been doing this for 6 years.
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22 responses to “The Pros and Cons of using Cheap China Brand Lights”
I have the yongnuo flash and it knocks the spots off my Metz that costs six times the prices, better layout, better recycling times better performance…. Just better!
Don’t forget that Nikon flashes have had overheating issues, and there are li-ion powered speedlights that should knock the socks off many AA-powered speedlights.
Just a little addition. I also wouldn’t ever drop any speedlight, they’re all pretty flimsy given what they have to do in such a small footprint (be lightweight, zoom, rotate, click, flash, recieve and/or transmit).
I know nothing about off brand studio strobes. I’m just impressed with what I read about youngnuo and I’m anxiously awaiting a fully featured TTL and remotely adjustable li-ion powered flash like the NEEWER TT850. Basically a few TT850’s mated with a YN-622N’s, and a YN-622-TX to control them.
I can dream (c’mon china, read this!)
Look for godox v860 is the same as tt850 but with TTL!!!!
OooOooOoOOOOO thanks!
I’m loving my Godox system (three V850 flashes, a spare LiOn battery, and one FT-16s trigger). Total cost? Around $350. Reliability? Unbelievable. Recycle time? Around 1.6 sec (full power). What not to like ;)
I also use a Godox 160 W studio strobe for the photos above
I bought two if the godox 300w flashheads… I have spent whole days shooting school portraits with them so anywhere up to 1800 flashes a day…Never let me down once
I now have 2 Godox V850, 1 V860-N, 1 V860II-N and two AD200 all controlled with the X1N. What an amazing eco-system. I have had the V850’s and the V860 for over two years and they work like a charm.
Doesn’t need to cost a lot, the person behind on the other hand ;-)
Nikon and Canon are nowadays made in China, so….
Oh please! Nearly everything is made in China. The question is always about quality control.
For all we know, Godox and youngnuo make Canon and Nikon flashes :-)
Even the basic Chevrolet Camaro is now a Daewoo…
My YN560 I baugh 4 years ago never over heat, recycles in a heartbeat and they always work. For less than $50 I can live without TTL.
Not sure I agree on all the cons there. Some of the Yongnuo speedlights feel easily as well built as my Nikons – and I’ve even had a Yongnuo YN560-III drown in a river and come out the other end (after 4 days of drying) as good as new.
Never had it them go off unexpectedly, and never had them not go off when I want them to.
I have experienced that with “branded” lights though (Elinchrom & Bowens) when using 433Mhz triggers. There’s just too much interference around here for triggers on that frequency to be reliable. Switch to Yongnuo RF-602 or RF-603 (2.4Ghz triggers) and all those issues went away.
Re: Hiring an assistant who doesn’t drop your gear… well, wouldn’t you want an assistant that doesn’t drop your stuff if it’s expensive branded gear, too? I know I would. :)
So if you where to venture into a set of strobes, what would you buy? I have 4 speed lights- 2 canon and 2 yongnuo.
Like Karl stated… for the upsides..I can live without TTL…and if I do get a bad one I’ll switch to one of the other three I bought for the same price of a name brand unit.
And if a flash was to drop onto the ground? I’m glad it was a cheap Yongnuo. Last one I did drop on rocks bounced quite high and I was able to catch it and only had to gaffer up the battery door.
This is just worry mongering, no figures or evidence to back up his assertions. chinese products have come on leaps and bounds over the last five years. I use may products at a third of the price ‘regular’ manafacturers charge and i have yet to have a problem. oh, and yes, I am a pro and use them nearly everyday.
Assistants shouldn’t drop gear irrespective of whether that gear is of Chinese origin or not
Sure there is a lot of cheap products out there but they make for great starter kits for those starting out. I started with some cheap yongnuos and cheap umbrellas just to learn and understand light. I have moved on to Einstein and the Paul C Buff modifiers. As a couple others here have mentioned the Godox system is quite nice I recently received the AD360 and am anxiously waiting to use it later today.
I bought the Nikon SB-900 in 2011, however, because it would just quits on me in a middle of a job when overheated, I used my SB-800 almost always as my main flash. I took off the overheat shutoff and the dam thing burnt. After an expensive repair this flash never worked the same. Overpriced garbage.
I have been using the Godox V860 and the V850 for over two years now and never had a single problem. They are amazing. Amazing built quality, amazing radio range and excellent light output.
Your article is generalizing and should be revised. Being a pro does not mean buying expensive gear. It means creating amazing images with whatever you have in your hands.