The powerful Pro-8a has a redesigned "digital" interface that resembles Profoto's D4 series of packs.

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One of the best things about new ultra-high-resolution digital SLRs, like the 24.5-megapixel Nikon D3X reviewed in last month's PDN, is the speed they offer in the studio compared to medium-format digital cameras. Capable of firing up to five frames per second, the Nikon D3X fared well in our studio tests where we photographed a pair of fast moving actresses as they worked through several comedic scenes.

In fact, the Nikon D3X was so swift that our strobes often couldn't keep pace with the camera, resulting in more than a few misfires. It's worth noting that this rarely, if ever, occurs with medium-format cameras we test, since even the fastest models chug along at just over 1 frame per second.

Swedish company Profoto, which has been a leader in professional studio lighting since the late 1960s, has a great new companion to all these new, speedy, DSLRs that are starting to infiltrate photo studios—a digital flash generator that is so fast your camera might not be able to keep up.

With a recycle time of just .9-second at a full power of 2400 watt-seconds, the Profoto Pro-8a Air is twice as fast as its predecessor the Pro 7. At lower power settings, the Pro-8a Air is demonically quick, capable of firing at up to 20 frames per second which is twice the rate of even the speediest digital SLR (Canon 1D Mark III, 10fps) on the market right now.

Seriously, when we achieved 20fps strobe firing in our studio tests of the Pro-8a Air flash generator, I felt like I was back in the haunted house from my childhood summers on the boardwalk in Ocean City, Maryland. Scary.

Arguably what's even more important than recycle time is the quality of the light a strobe pack puts out. Anybody can be fast but can you be fast and good? With the Pro-8a, we found the output to be extremely accurate with consistent color throughout our studio shots of a model, even when firing quick bursts with a DSLR.

But as with the costly Nikon D3X ($8,000), this quality comes at a price. For the Profoto Pro-8a Air, it's a $10,999 street price for the generator alone. Let's take a look to see if it's worth it.


NICE PACKAGE

It's amazing that a power pack this powerful could come in such a slim and trim package. While testing the Pro-8a Air 8 with Jason Groupp, www.jasongphoto.com, in his studio, we dragged Jason's bulky old Profoto Pro-5 pack out of the closet and the comparison with the sleek new model was laughable.

Though it's certainly far closer in size and weight to the more recent Pro-7, the 27-pound Pro-8a has some nice new design touches with slightly curved corners, two ergonomic grips on each side rather than just one in the middle, and a cleaner overall look with a logical layout of switches and dials. Hard to think of a flash generator as being "elegant," but the stylish, black Pro-8a Air comes pretty close to that description.

Though Profoto touts the redesigned Pro-8a having a "new completely digital interface," that's overstating it a bit. It does look a lot like Profoto's smaller D4 series of power packs which offer the same control as the Pro-8a but with a slower recycling time (2.2 seconds at 2400 watt seconds) and longer flash duration. (The D4 is considerably cheaper than the Pro-8a but with the slower speed it's aimed more at tabletop photographers.)


INDEPENDENT CONTROL

Each of the two lamp head sockets on the Pro-8a is controlled independently with the settings viewable in green on LED screens. The first thing you'll notice with the power settings for the heads is that they default to "F/Stops" rather than traditional watt seconds. F/Stop numbers on the pack are actually a relative scale and not meant to correspond directly to f/stops on your camera.

So, for example, if you set one of the sockets to 9.0 on the pack and you get a reading of f/8 on the meter, when you adjust the pack to 8.0 (one stop lower) the meter will read f/5.6. If you're not familiar with this nomenclature already it takes a little getting used to but it's actually a lot more accurate than adjusting based on watt seconds.

However, if you're more comfortable with watt seconds, press the w/s button on the pack and you'll see the comparable setting, i.e. 10 equals 2400 watt seconds; 9 equals 1200 watt seconds, etc.

We stumbled a little on how to lock the pack so it would only show the watt seconds, not the f/stops. To do that, you need to press and hold the w/s button for eight seconds and it switches over. Not exactly intuitive.

There's a lot of control in the dials on the Pro-8a though. Lindsey, Jason's assistant, really liked that though pressing down the power knobs while turning them will change the settings in full stop increments, just turning them will increase power in 1/10th of stop increments. That's very handy when you're looking for just the right flash of light.

When a second head is plugged into the pack, the generator automatically picks the lowest power setting as the default. That doesn't affect the first head, however, since they both operate independently; you can keep the first head at 9 and the second at 1, for example.

Though it's a powerful pack, you can't run both heads at full power; the A head has a maximum setting of 10 while the B head has a max of 9. (OK, no Spinal Tap jokes about how your flash generators "go to 11.")