Off Camera Flash Frustration (long post)

[jml79]

Oh the learning curve.... I have a borrowed Sony HVLF42AM sony flash. It works great on the camera (remember sony has the oddball minolta flash mount) and in sony's off camera wireless mode that uses a simple optical trigger. I liked using it off camera, read a bunch of stuff about strobing and thought hey why not... Simple right.

I dug around in my basement and found my old Pentax thyristor flash and an old Minolta flash from the MF era when Minolta used a standard hotshoe. Bought a simple hotshoe optical slave trigger and thought I would try some 2 and maybe 3 light setups before investing in a bunch of newer flashes. I knew that I would have to adjust for the '3' power levels of the thyristor flashes and play a bit but figured it was a worth while trade off to learn on the cheap.

I setup my 'new' off camera flash on my short tri-pod, set the camera into wireless mode (WL) and hit the test button. My cheap, old flash fired right on cue. Great so I try taking a picture and am greeted by a black screen with a touch of light in the center. Hmm maybe the flash didn't go off so I take a picture just holding the camera while looking at the flash. It went off but the screen showed me the same almost black screen. About now I am checking to see if I forgot the lens cap. Nope it's not there. I decide to setup in front of a nice reflective tv so I can see the flashes in the picture. Every picture is the same, black with a small bit of light in the middle. Ok, this is odd.

I try slowing the shutter to a crawl in case there is to much lag, I try max speed. Nothing is working. I turn on the Sony flash and everything is just fine. Now I am getting a little frustrated. I know that this is a timing issue but how to fix it. I flip the camera to fill flash and dial the flash compensation all the way down. Awesome. Now my Pentax flash is working perfect and I can see it's effect in every frame but the Sony flash is just sitting there doing nothing. Back to WL mode and the Sony works and the Pentax fires way before my shutter.

I pop the Sony flash on my camera and and set it to fill mode. Viola, everything is working now. Thanks Sony for a great camera with the most useless flash mount ever devised. The WL mode of Sony uses a delay in the Sony flashes. This way the on camera flash will not affect the lighting (great idea) but at the same time, it is now incompatible with simple optical slave systems. The mid level Sony flash does not have a traditional slave mode (but it has full manual controls) so it can only work in Sony WL mode that won't properly trigger anything else. I would just pop a cheap optical trigger on the Sony flash but that damn Minolta mount gets in the way again.

The work around isn't really that big of a deal. A Minolta/Sony to hotshoe adapter is only $15 and that will allow me to use any old manual flash or a radio trigger and an adapter for my flash is about the same which will allow me to use standard accessories with it.

Well until I buy the adapters I will have to settle with a one flash off camera setup for now. I love how each company finds some way to inconvenience photogs. Why can't they come up with a universal standard for lenses and flashes and be done with it (and don't tell me that hotshoe is universal because a Canon flash will not fully work on a Nikon and vice-versa)

Well done with my rant for now. Merry Christmas all.

[OsmosisStudios]

It's the TTL preflash that the flash is sending out to judge the amount of light it has to put out to get a decent exposure. What happens, though, is that the preflash triggers the dumb optical slave.

This is common in ALL TTL flash systems when using an optical slave.

If you use a radio trigger of some kind, you wont have this problem.

[inkista]

If you're OK with the Sony as an on-camera "master", try putting it in Manual mode (i.e., set an explicit power level: 1, 1/2, 1/4, etc., and don't use the WL or Auto modes). This will (hopefully) eliminate the pre-flash. That way, both the Pentax and old Minoltas with their "dumb" optical slaves should sync properly with the master on-shoe flash.

Welcome to the nightmare that is trying to mix TTL and manual flash triggering.

And yeah, I'm with you. That Minolta hotshoe is an annoying PITA when it comes to Strobist fun.

[jml79]

Originally Posted by inkista

If you're OK with the Sony as an on-camera "master", try putting it in Manual mode (i.e., set an explicit power level: 1, 1/2, 1/4, etc., and don't use the WL or Auto modes). This will (hopefully) eliminate the pre-flash. That way, both the Pentax and old Minoltas with their "dumb" optical slaves should sync properly with the master on-shoe flash.

Welcome to the nightmare that is trying to mix TTL and manual flash triggering.

And yeah, I'm with you. That Minolta hotshoe is an annoying PITA when it comes to Strobist fun.

I have been doing this. I have also found that with a careful setup I can use the much more sensitive Sony flash off camera using Sony's WL mode and the others will trigger off of it. I just have to make sure that I put small baffles around the dumb syncs so that they don't see the weak on camera timing flash. Only the much more powerful off camera flash.

I think my next purchase will be a Minolta-Hotshoe adapter and an inexpensive set of radio syncs. Then anything else can sync off of the radio synced off camera flash. Solves a ton of problems and then when I have the money I will just buy more receivers. And then some light stands, a new tripod, a couple of umbrellas, a new lens, newer and bigger flashes....it never ends.

With careful planning I should be able to make my lighting setup generic so that if/when I get a different system it will be transferable. I vow to only ever buy 1 TTL flash for whatever system I am using at the time.

[jml79]

I figured out a real solution that gives me all 3 off camera flashes. It's called electrical tape (gaffers tape would likely work too). I found that the Sony flash is amazingly sensitive. And the cheap slave sensor are not (surprise, surprise.) If I put tape over 3/4's of my onboard flash and place the Sony flash anywhere on the slightly exposed side then it will work and none of the other flashes will trigger from the camera. They all trigger from the delayed Sony flash. I burned through a set of batteries making sure that this was reliable.

Radio triggers would be so much easier.

[inkista]

Wow. Good job! I think I'd have given up and just ordered radio triggers and hotshoe adapters.