Bike Rider Magazine Shoot

My colleage Jeremy is writing an article for "Bike Riders Magazine" and he need some help taking photos for his article. He's a passionate bike rider and he's writing it for free.. so naturally, the shoot is free. But its an exciting opportunity for me cause I never shot Bikes before and It'll be published in a magazine.

After waiting two weekends for a good weather , we took our chance yesterday under cloudy sky. The shot went pretty well except two things.

First, my cheap Tamron 70-300mm Di LD Macro 's slow focusing challenged me. I used manual exposure mode and servo focus mode to achieve the fast moving looking pics like these.



After that, when I was about to shoot portraits, my optical slave on my SB-24 fails to fire. I was really disappointed. I am actually hoping to get good strobist shots on that shoot.. but well.. I gotta get Cactus V2 radio triggers.. or should I get a 580ex?

With 580Ex and my ST-E2, i can get full wireless E-TTL strobe setup with lighting ratios directly controlable from my camera.. no need to run around and set flash power. Downside? it's infrared based system.. so it need line of sight to work. And of course, its expensive. Even a 2nd hand 580ex mark I will cost $500+.
Cactus V2 seems a decent solution but it'll render my ST-E2 useless and as I said, I have to adjust flash power manually. I don't mind doing that but its a hassle going back and forth between strobes and camera. But I think its the price to pay for being a strobist on the cheap. :)

As you can see.. it'll be nice to have second strobe to use as Fill or back light..

This shot looks okay without the strobes but it'd be better with strobes in my opinion.
Anyway.. more photos in my picassa album.. check it out.. and feel free to leave a comment here or in my shout box of the left.