What studio strobes do you use and what should I buy?

I was recently asked, “what type of strobes do you use?” My short answer is, “anything it takes to get the shot and anything that is available.”

It took some time to develop a knack to adapt to whatever I had on hand; even so, a situation will arise on nearly every shoot where what you have isn’t quite doing what you need and you are forced rely on your creativeness and resourcefulness to get the shot. 

I’ll be honest, I did not always have the budget for quality strobes. Despite having obtained a few, I find them grossly overpriced. Consequently, I try my best to minimize my dependency on any particular brand as much as I can. You’ll find that that when you start buying that most of the connectors are proprietary and that you’re obligated to buy into a system of modifiers and attachments that won’t fit anything else. 

Back to the question at hand, “what type of strobes do you use?” I’ve used Elinchrom RX strobes, Canon Speedlites and something tells me I’ve used AlienBees before but I can’t remember where. Additionally, I must have used a half dozen third party cheap import lights over the years before learning that quality matters in color and power consistency. 

For a person looking to buy strobes my top criteria would be to buy for:

1. Mobility - nothing more frustratng than lugging wires and huge heavy lights everywhere. Find a head with a built-in power pack or at least is adaptable to work with a power pack.
2. Price - Don’t ever buy what you can’t afford. As long as your strobes can produce consistent color and power you can become highly proficient in whatever you have. Even the least expensive unit can produce high fashion looks if you’re creative enough. I’ve often had to build my own modifiers, reflectors, or flats to shape the light.
3. Adaptability - sometimes you will need a beauty dish, a barn door, a soft box, a reflector, a strip box or an octabox. The more adaptable and configurable your strobe is the better off you’ll be in doing different types of photography . 
4. Cross brand capability - every single modifier you need may not be available in the brand you’re considering so consider a brand that has conversion rings and adaptable plates for moving from one popular brand to another on your modifiers.  
5. Availability - You need one more light but the local shop’s inventory doesn’t go into your setup or power needs. There are times you need to run to the camera store and rent another but they don’t carry a brand that matches your modifiers. Or the brand you have has been discontinued. Buy a mainstream top brand largely for it’s sustainability, it’s applicability to your shooting style but not because of popularity or price. 

I hope this was of some help. I can’t really say what I shoot with specifically because I’m always changing and adapting what I need to a given situation and a given photo shoot.