D3100 with SB-700?

[Brookeabee123]

I'm looking to get my first external flash and I really want the SB-700, but is this the right type of external flash for my camera? I know my camera doesn't have a flash commander on it so there's no way I could use the SB-700 as an off camera flash, which is a real bummer , but as long as it's in my camera's hot shoe will it work as the master flash to other speedlights? I'd really like to get creative with my lighting and I just can't do that with my camera's built in flash. Also my budget is kinda tight, but I'm willing to splurge a bit in order to buy a Nikon flash so I won't have as difficult of a time setting everything up. But does anyone know of any cheap speedlights that would be great for just off camera lighting???

SB-700 AF Speedlight from Nikon

Thank you!!!

[OsmosisStudios]

Youve got everything pretty clear.

[inkista]

Originally Posted by Brookeabee123

I'm looking to get my first external flash and I really want the SB-700, but is this the right type of external flash for my camera?

Yes. If you want to do on-camera event shooting, absolutely the right one, if you can't afford an SB-900 .

I know my camera doesn't have a flash commander on it so there's no way I could use the SB-700 as an off camera flash, which is a real bummer ,

Actually, you can use it off-camera, but not with full iTTL/remote commanding capability. The SB-700 has SU-4 mode in it, which is a "dumb" optical slave mode (i.e., not CLS). But it will remotely fire the flash off-camera when its sensor "sees" another flash burst. If you put the pop-up flash of the D3100 into manual mode, and the SB-700 into SU-4 mode, you could use it off-camera without any additional equipment. It would require line-of-sight, though (i.e., the sensor on the flash has to have a clear line of sight to the pop-up flash of your camera).

You could also remotely fire the SB-700 from your camera hotshoe with full iTTL function if you used a TTL sync cable.

And you can use cheap radio triggers if you want better outdoor range and/or to eliminate the "line of sight" requirement.

So, there are ways to take it off-camera, other than CLS.

....but as long as it's in my camera's hot shoe will it work as the master flash to other speedlights?

Yes, as long as they speak CLS.

.... But does anyone know of any cheap speedlights that would be great for just off camera lighting???

Yes, but you will be giving up a lot of function using them, and I'd generally recommend them as second or third flash purchase, not a first flash purchase. Getting an SB-700 is a good idea because you can use it both on-camera and off with all the bells'n'whistles.

But if you're going to go with cheap radio triggers that can't do anything but fire a flash remotely (no iTTL, no high-speed sync, etc. link), then you could go a lot cheaper with an all-manual flash option, such as a LumoPro LP160 ($160), or a Yongnuo YN-560 ($70). But these types of flashes utterly suck for on-camera work.

I would also highly recommend learning on-camera and TTL flash as well as off-camera and all-manual. There's a time and a place for each, and knowing the tools that are available can help you choose the appropriate one for the task you want to achieve. On-camera and bouncing and using TTL can be great when you want to travel light and have to shoot fast. Off-camera and manual is for when you have time to chimp, adjust, and reshoot. If you started with the Strobist, but are getting flooded with too much information, I'd suggest falling back a little, and thinking about using a single on-camera speedlight, first, and mastering bouncing via Tangents.

The Tangents blog/website is by Neil van Niekerk, and it pretty much does for on-camera flash what the Strobist website does for off-camera flash. It's good to know both.

And above all: before you start with flash photography, be comfortable shooting in M mode on the camera, first. You're going to need that ability to balance flash against ambient when you start doing flash photography. If you're still shooting in full auto or P mode, and M mode scares you, I say learn to shoot in M mode before attaching a flash. It won't take long, and it will make learning lighting much less confusing.

[Brookeabee123]

Great advice! Thank you! I don't have any teaching with photography other than the internet and I've had my camera now for about a month, but I forced myself to start in Manual mode. It was really confusing at first, but I think I am finally getting the hang of it! Thanks again for the help!

[inkista]

You're welcome! And feel free to ask questions when you do get your flash and start learning. There are a lot of folks here who are knowledgeable about lighting and can give you good advice. Flash photography can be a bit more confusing than ambient photography to wrap your brain around.

In addition, the Strobist also has a Flickr group. Their discussions are probably the best source for information on any specific light/trigger combinations you've got in mind.

[Christopher Debono]

hi, i'm enthusiast guy with a D3100. like the guy before, i'm willing to go for the SB-700 but i was reading on the net that my camera cannot sync with at high speed say 1/600 even though the flash supports this function!

is it truly useful as an option? how much do you get to use such function...In the beginning the choice was between the the Sigma DG 610 Super but i choose the SB-700 due to it's very fast recycle time...i still haven't boaght it yet but i'm about to buy the SB-700. any suggestions would really help as i'm still confused with such stuff!

thanks guys...

[Doug Sundseth]

You're correct, that body doesn't support high-speed sync.

It's used to reduce the ambient contribution to a scene that is also flash-lit. For example, you might want to shoot outdoors in sunlight, with the sun behind your subject, and get rich colors in the sunlit background. You can reduce the ambient exposure by using a high shutter speed, then add front lighting with a flash (preferably off camera). With a high enough shutter speed, you can also use a wide aperture to blur the background in the same circumstances.

Your other choice there is to use neutral density filters to reduce the light entering the lens and use very powerful studio lighting to provide the front light you want.

So, it's useful, but situational.

[inkista]

Originally Posted by Christopher Debono

is [high-speed sync] truly useful as an option? how much do you get to use such function...

As Doug said, it's situational. In certain situations, it can be very useful. Here's a shot I took with my Panasonic G3 and an off-camera Yongnuo YN-560 in a small softbox, triggered with RF-602 radio triggers.



Here's my basic EXIF:
lens: Panasonic Lumix G 20mm f/1.7
iso 200
f/16
1/160s

My flash was at about 1/16 power, I think, and I was holding it out in my left hand, while shooting with the camera in my right.

This was a sunny day out in the Flower Fields of Carlsbad. I wanted to underexpose the ambient by a stop or two to get a blue sky as the background and then fill in the flowers with flash. But. My maximum sync speed with this camera body is 1/160s. (Your D3100's limit is 1/200s).

So, I can't go any faster than 1/160s to cut down the light, and I didn't have much more room on the iso (my minimum iso setting is 160). I had to stop all the way down to f/16 to underexpose the ambient by 1.5EV. Which then screws with my getting anything like shallow depth of field, even though I've got an f/1.7 lens that's perfectly capable of doing it.

So, high-speed sync would have let me use a wider aperture. But I would have needed a TTL-capable flash, and a TTL-capable triggering method to use it (say, my 580EX and a TTL sync cable).

The workaround in this situation without HSS is to put a neutral density filter on the lens, to cut down the amount of light coming in (kind of sunglasses for your camera), but I didn't pack one that day.

If you aren't shooting outdoors and jonesing for shallow depth of field, though, chances are good you aren't likely to run into the HSS limitation very often. While with ambient light photography, you tend to think of "freezing the action" with shutter speed, with flash photography, the flash burst can do the freezing for you, and is much faster than your max. shutter speed.

[Almond.Butterscotch]

Inkista for the win! [Again.]

Originally Posted by inkista

Actually, you can use it off-camera, but not with full iTTL/remote commanding capability. The SB-700 has SU-4 mode in it, which is a "dumb" optical slave mode (i.e., not CLS). But it will remotely fire the flash off-camera when its sensor "sees" another flash burst. If you put the pop-up flash of the D3100 into manual mode, and the SB-700 into SU-4 mode, you could use it off-camera without any additional equipment. It would require line-of-sight, though (i.e., the sensor on the flash has to have a clear line of sight to the pop-up flash of your camera).

I don't suppose the SB-600 can do this and I've missed it?

[Christopher Debono]

that was a pretty good technique to reduce ambient lighting and get a blue sky with properly exposed subjects.... thanks for that. i'm still a beginner with flash photography and i'm willing to get a good grasp of it. so you think that the SB-700 is a good choice? (bearing in mind i've got an entry-level camera body). can i base my decision on the recycle time which this flash has? (i.e. 2.5s on NI-MH battery?)

thanks again guys. i really appreciate your help