Camera Craniums: The Photography Community for Enthusiasts

A question for the knowledgeable many on CC. I would like to do some outdoor shoots, with smoke machine and several studio flashes. To get power to these items I am thinking of getting a cheap and cheerful 2 stroke generator (roughly £100). Now somewhere in my mind alarm bells are ringing and I am dreading blowing my flashes to bits. I have heard about terminology like "sine wave" converters and like most things electrical I am at a loss. Would a simple caravan like genny do the job, or do I have to save more and go for something specific dedicated to photography?? Weight is not a big issue, because I have a big entourage of hangers on that can carry things. (No, not the models) Anybody out there that has followed this path??

It might work.  It might blow your lights up.  Odds are it will work for a bit then your lights will mysteriously stop working.  You really want a pure sine inverter.

IIRC the current draw from monolights is MASSIVE for a really short time and this can stall some genys.  The good smoke machines also draw a lot of power.  You want one much more powerful than you think.

People do this and it works but if it was easy there would be a generator pack on the market and AFAIK there isn't.

Basically, you want one of these http://www.innovatronix.com/prodindex.asp

Thanks Jonathan for your quick reply.
I sort of guessed that a genny would not work for the long run. Thanks for the link. These things are basically dollar for pound in this country. I found them now at park cameras. Still a lot cheaper than I thought they would be. I think I will wait until I have the money and go for one of these.
Thanks again.