Can't afford a speedlight for camera?

And i'm planning to do some low key photography like this one.
Most of the speedlights i find at london drugs and futureshop all cost over 200. I was thinking of buying a bright flashlight to replace the speedlight. I have a nikon d5000 so i need to also buy a wireless flash trigger thats cheap. Any ideas on models.

Kool,

go onto ebay or the like and get a no name (not nikon, not canon, not sony et cetera) portable flash, also look for a wireless trigger and receiver,

low key is achieved by "snooting" a flash, you can make your own snoot to fit whatever portable flash you buy,

try diyphotography.com for how to make your own snoot,

any model will do i find, i use one i got for $5 a lot its very nice the name is "achiever" very cheap most "photographers" would look at it and think it cost $5 its can't be any good… It is how it is used,

if you see them for cheap enough on online auctiions just buy them i find one can never have enough

TTL is not the only way to go, Manual everything has advantages, first the manual flash is around a quarter of the price (look up Yongnuo YN- 460, 460 Mkll or YN- 560, there are others), these flashes can sync with cheap radio sync, I've found the RF-602 to be 100% reliable and is far cheaper than the dedicated TTL lead from Nikon, it also works up to 100Mts and can also trip your camera remotely with the required lead to fit your cameras remote socket which is a bonus.

Set up in Manual Mode as per the video, set your shutter speed to your cameras X speed (the fastest speed that allows the shutter to open fully), then adjust the flash output to get the exposure you want, this is the bit that TTL does automatically, but it has limits, with manual you can go beyond those limits, you'll get exactly the same result with far less cash spent. You can experiment by slowing the shutter speed the more you slow it the more ambient is allowed into the shot, simpler than TTL.

Most studio flash is manual, so it's good practice for that, after a while it actually gets easier to use than TTL, I only use TTL flash for fill in these days, for anything creative in blending ambient to flash manual is faster with practice, avoids a load of mental juggling and loads cheaper.

See this site

http://strobist.blogspot.com/2006/02/welcome-to-strobist.html

Look in the 101 Archive for loads of 'How To's'.

It's much easier to make basic low-key portraits using natural light from a window, as I believe the video explains. So try that for a start and see how you get on. You have a good DSLR with sufficient controls so just go for it.

I use mostly pocket wizard plus IIs for a radio trigger and they are far from cheap but a while back I got some radio popper triggers to try and was plesantly surprised by function and reliability. As to speedlights look at older used ones just make sure that they will not have hotshoe trigger voltages that will damage your camera if used on camera, used off camera with a radio trigger, or optical slave all are good

I did this low-key shot using nothing but three desk lamps I found around the house (the kind you can get at Walmart for $8). A speedlight is easier to use and you'll get faster shutter speeds, but low-key photography is doable on a very tight budget.