Flash slaves.

Hi everybody, I was thinking of getting a new flash. I was wondering if I could buy something like this: http://www.adorama.com/FASE.html, so that I could use my old flash (200E) as a slave. Anybody have any experience with that particular slave unit? I'm still very new so any help would be appreciated, thanks.

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Originally Posted by TEMPESTboy

Hi everybody, I was thinking of getting a new flash. I was wondering if I could buy something like this: http://www.adorama.com/FASE.html, so that I could use my old flash (200E) as a slave. Anybody have any experience with that particular slave unit? I'm still very new so any help would be appreciated, thanks.

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That depends. I just looked at the link and there was only a picture. Here is the deal, if it is triggered by a flash, as I imagine it is based on the price, and you have a Canon that uses a preflash to set the exposure, the slave will be triggered by the preflash and then not have a charge for the main flash. That is why the Canon and Nikon flash units use infrared communication. This can drive you crazy. You see the slave flash fire, yet its effect is not apparent in the picture.

Ya, there is no description for the unit. I'm pretty sure it's flash triggered though. I have a Rebel Ti and I don't think it does a preflash for a exposure! I was thinking of even using my pop-up flash to trigger the 200e with the slave unit attached to it. If there are any other suggestions in getting started with slaves, please let me know. This just catches my attention because it is so inexpensive.

in regards to your canon's metering flash - the camera uses an e-ttl burst when you press the shutter. It then meters off of this flash and calculates the flash required to properly illuminate the scene.

"First, the E-TTL preflash occurs immediately before the shutter opens and not when the shutter release is pressed halfway. Unlike the A-TTL preflash, therefore, the E-TTL preflash is actually used to determine flash exposure and isn’t fired during the ambient (existing) metering stage. Some users may be surprised to learn that E-TTL actually fires a prefire flash before the main flash at all. Using regular settings the process happens so quickly that the preflash is difficult to notice, though you might catch glimpse of it before the mirror blackout"

see http://photonotes.org/articles/eos-flash/#ettl for a pretty good explanation of your flash system, if you are interested. If your lights are flash triggered you might be able to disable the ettl burst as described later in the article. I hope this is helpful.

-pete

Thanks for the article, that helped. I guess I didn't even notice the preflash. I'll read into this more before I get started with the slaves. Thanks again.

Try it in a fairly dark room where the AF has trouble focusing. It'll flash like crazy until the AF finds a spot to focus on.

Danny

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Originally Posted by shadz

Try it in a fairly dark room where the AF has trouble focusing. It'll flash like crazy until the AF finds a spot to focus on.

Danny

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Isn't that just the AF assist though? I know that happens when it is trying to focus in low lighting. The E-TTL is the flash that I didn't notice.

After reading more carefully I stand corrected. I never noticed that one either.