Reply To: First Attempt — Basketball Flash Photography

[cameraclicker]

At full power a Canon 600 EX RT (Guide Number, 197′ (60 m) at ISO 100) is roughly equivalent to a 250 WS monolight.
From the manual:  The SB-910 is a high-performance Speedlight compatible with Nikon Creative
Lighting System (CLS) with a guide number of 34/48 (ISO 100/200, m)
(111.5/157.5, ft) (at the 35 mm zoom head position in Nikon FX format with
standard illumination pattern, 20 °C/68 °F).

That suggests it may be equivalent to a 200 WS monolight.

Speedlites recycle faster at part power because their circuitry allows them to keep unused charge.  Most Monolights use different components and dump the entire charge every flash.  Flash from small flash is about 10 times faster than from a monolight.  Flash using High Speed Sync is slower than when a single burst is used, but that should not matter when shooting people.  On the other hand, you don’t get as much power when using HSS.   I expected you to be using a speedlight because monolights are large and you can’t really run around with them, or at least, I wouldn’t want to with mine.

The Nikon Creative Lighting System is more complicated than just “flash when you see another flash”.  It should not be affected by P&S flashes, though they may mask the CLS control flashes and cause it to not fire.  Radio is more reliable.  Some radios are inexpensive, and some not.

Your light must be up high!  Even the shadow from the backboard in the first photo is dropped a little.