DIY Studio Strobe Part 2: Manual Power Controller
How you can build a manual power controller for the Vivitar 283 vintage electronic flash.
I love black and white film photography and I love using old equipment and old techniques in my photography where I can. I also love recycling old equipment and modifying it to give it a new lease of life.
In this three article series, I show how a vintage Vivitar 283 speedlight can be upcycled to create an affordable and versatile Bowens-compatible studio strobe.
In Part 1, I explained how to add a modelling light to a Vivitar 283 (or other similar speedlight) using a Rollei LED cube light and a Bowens-compatible Godox speedlight adapter.
I’m not a professional photographer. Photography is a hobby not a source of income. I shoot film for a number of reasons including the lack of the immediacy and instant gratification and that I’m challenged to use my imagination a little bit more, as a consequence. Since it’s a hobby I can also afford the time to appreciate the old school aesthetic of the flashing indicator lamps and extra cables that are part of the experience of using vintage lighting accessories.
The Vivitar 283
The Vivitar 283 is the most popular electronic flash unit in the history of 35mm photography. It was in production for 30+ years from the 1970s onwards at a time before TTL (Through The Lens) flash metering was affordable. It’s durable, powerful, simple to use with four auto f-stop settings for controlling depth-of-field, a bounce head and a flash range of less than 1m to over 13m (guide number 36 at ISO 100). Vivitar also manufactured a large range of accessories including lens kits, filter kits, off camera sensor cables and external power cords.
It was relatively inexpensive when new and this plus the long product production life means that they remain cheap and readily available on eBay and elsewhere despite being highly prized. For example, the 283 can sync at shutter speeds of 1/8000 second and faster and has a minimum flash duration of around 1/30,0000 second (0.03ms) which makes them popular for high speed photography.
I have three 283s that I purchased on eBay in 2008 for just this reason: high speed photography work including photographing breaking glass and that sort for thing. They were recommended to me because of their fast minimum flash duration and the ease of modification, literally you can do it with just a paper clip.
My 283s are all the later, “revised” model that was sold from the late 1980’s onwards and stamped “Made in China”. The first one I purchased for £20 and the other two I purchased for £35 for the pair. Since then, they’ve largely held their value with one in good condition currently costing around €30-35 on eBay including shipping.
The Vivitar 283 as a Studio Strobe
Most recently, I’ve been using my 283s for studio work. One of my Covid-driven lifestyle changes is that I now spend less time in the office and as a result I have more time to focus on my film photography including creating a storage box studio.
Vivitar made the 283 to be used off-camera and included support of an external AC power adapter, a variable (manual) power controller and even a wireless trigger.
Knowing When Your Strobe is Ready to Use
In addition to having a blinking light on the back of the unit, two of my three 283s beep continuously once they are fully charged. (I assume the third one is faulty). At full power, using rechargeable (NiMH) AA batteries the 283 needs around 6 seconds to before it is ready again. This is known as the recycle time.
This is especially useful if cannot see the light because the strobe is high up, behind you or behind your model. If you’re shooting digitally, then you can always check the image and reshoot if the strobe didn’t fire but when you’re shooting with film you don’t have that luxury. You can easily waste a lot of time and film if you are taking multiple shots in quick succession and you shoot before one or more of your strobes is ready.
Batteries
The beeping also serves as a reminder to turn your strobes off when you’re not using them. The 283 doesn’t turn it’s self off automatically and if left on it will deplete it’s batteries in around 24 hours.
I use rechargeable (NiMH) AA batteries. The small size of my studio means that most of the time I’m using my strobes at 1/16 power or less, so 1900mA rechargeable batteries work fine and typically last long enough for me to shoot 8–10 rolls of film.
In addition to four AA batteries, you can also use an external AC power adapter (SB-4). Though I rarely use mine. In a bigger studio where you need higher power, the advantage of the SB-4 is that it delivers slightly faster recycling times. Since my storage box studio doesn’t have power I don’t have that option but the benefits are tiny compared to the inconvenience of having the extra cables to step over.
Manual Power Control
The big problem with using a 283 for studio work is that you cannot easily control the power in manual mode. You are limited to using it at full power.
Vivitar sold a variable power controller (PV-1) that plugs into the front of the 283 but these are quite rare and also tricky to use when you want less than 1/8 power. The solution is to build your own controller.
Building Your Own Manual Power Controller
You can find details of how to build your own power controller for the Vivitar 283 on hackster.io. If you have access to a soldering iron then you can do this for around than €30.
The 283 has a plug-in light sensor on the front. The resistance of this sensor changes depending on the amount of light. When the 283 is mounted on the camera, the sensor measures the reflected light and turns off the flash when sufficient light has reached the camera.
The manual power controller replaces the sensor with a device that sets the resistance using a rotary switch. This allows you to dial in the power you want in a straightforward and repeatable way.
Results
A series of shots showing the different power levels with the Vivitar 283 mounted in a a Neewer 60cm x 60cm softbox plus grid in a classic Rembrandt lighting setup.
The shots were taken with a Nikon F80D with a 50mm lens and using Fomapan 100 (ISO 100) at f4 and 1/60 second.
The film was developed in Fomadon LQN (6:45 at 20°C in a rotary processor), scanned using Vuescan and a reflecta ProScan 10T scanner (at 5000dpi) and converted in Lightroom Classic using Negative Lab Pro.
