Questions about Flashes

[j0rdanisme]

Hey Folks,
I am new to the forum, however, not a complete rookie when it comes to photography :P thank god. We recently picked up a Canon EOS 7D and have recently been disappointed when trying to shoot in the woods. I was shooting at a ISO of 2000, which after some though and talking with a friendly photographer I realized that infact 2000 is high, and he hardly shoots past ISO 1600.

So, I have a couple small questions.
1) Can lens quality contribute to noise at higher ISO's? (obviously so, but to how far of an extent)
2) Seeing as you cant really get past this its obvious that I will need some flash units for situations like this. Would i find the performance of a hot shoe mounted master flash better with a geniune Canon flash (Speedlight or so forth) or would it be ok to purchase something of lesser quality/price (Vivitar or other).
3) Last but not least what what be a good budget RF transmitter/receiver combo? I've read a fair amount of people saying the new PocketWizard stuff is crap. After doing some more research I found Alienbee triggers, any idea on how these work in comparison to PW?

Thanks for your help in advance! Any more questions just ask.

[mjs1973]

Welcome to the Forum and congrats on the new camera. I'm not sure I can be of much help, but here it goes.

1) I'm not sure how the lens quality would contribute to noise. The noise is being caused at the sensor. A faster lens may allow you to shoot at a lower ISO which would reduce the level of noise.

3) I skipped #2 because I wanted to mention something about #3 first. The 7D has a built in flash control system so I'm not sure you would need a RF transmitter/receiver. I guess it depends on how you set things up. I believe the 7D's system is IR and line of site so that may be limiting for what you want to do? Using the Canon system would allow you to maintain the use of E-TTL with the flashes and I'm not sure if that is true with other brands of flash. This may play a roll in answering #2.

As far as the PW's go, they have seemed to be the industry standard for RF triggers for the last few years. It seems I remember hearing some complaints about the newest version as well, but I don't remember what they were.

[Photo-John]

Hey Jordan - welcome to the site. Good to see you here

I wouldn't even go as high as ISO 1600 with the 7D, if possible. The one shot where I did that was pretty dirty looking. I shot it dark at ISO 1600 and then pushed it fairly hard in post-processing. But I really liked the ambient light and didn't want to use flash, so I gave it a shot. I am including that photo here just for reference. Ideally, with the 7D, I'd try to go no higher than ISO 800.



mjs1973 is right about the built-in slave on the 7D. I had actually forgotten about that. I need to explore it and see how it works. I have two old 550 EX flashes and they've worked great for me for years. I also have an old set of PWs and they've worked well, too. Evidently there is a shielding problem with the new Canon flashes and PWs that cut the range down to something like 10 feet. But there's no problem with my 550s. Most of the people I've seen complain about PWs are ski photographers who shoot at much longer distances and deal with more moisture and super low temps. For me, shooting in the redwoods in Santa Cruz and at races, they've been great.

The Vivitar flashes are solid but totally manual. I would recommend getting at least one Canon flash so you have the option of totally auto flash. It's nice if you need to set up quick or you just feel lazy. I shot a whole National with the flash on my camera once cause my PWs and cable were in lost luggage. It's not as dramatic, but it gets the job done.

[j0rdanisme]

Ok, now this brings me to my next question. As I don't want to worry about Line of Sight and so forth I will be getting triggers with the flashes. I have been doing some research and I personally think that I would prefer to shoot with some smaller flashes, 550's, or 580's even. However, the idea of having something more "robust" like a White Lightening kit or something like that Is appealing.

I know you have shot a ton of riding John, do you prefer to have small flashes, or big flashes? Anytime you have been "dissapointed" with your small flashes?

[Photo-John]

I'm not really a flash expert. For that, you might be better off posting a new question on the Studio & Lighting forum.

I would definitely get some Canon flashes - at least one. You can get a second Vivitar or something specifically for use with radio slaves. But you want at least one Canon that you can mount on the camera if you're shooting a tradeshow or party. The built-in wireless with the 7D works great, too. I just dug into the manual and tried it out with one of my 550s. As long as your flash supports wireless IR triggering, you're good. That means you can do some close, TTL metered, wireless flash without having radio slaves. I'm pretty psyched about that!

I don't have any strobes other than my Canon flashes. I just don't do enough paid mtb work to justify it. Ian Hylands and Erik Seo are both flash action sports flash masters and I think they both use Alien Bees. There are two reasons to go with something other than a hot shoe flash - at least as I understand it. One is the quality of light. A bigger light with a reflector has a softer more natural look. The other reason - and a more important one for shooting action - is flash duration. This is a spec that's often overlooked. But different strobes have different durations. That duration spec can be a critical exposure value. You can use the flash duration to help you freeze action when your shutter speed might not be able to do it.

Overall I have been very happy with my 550s. I don't do a ton of off-camera flash, though. I feel like the look of it is sort of overdone in action sports. But in some environments - North Vancouver, the redwoods in Santa Cruz or at night, it's not optional. And some people are really good with it. Ian sort of made his name with fancy strobe work. He's really, really good with it. But to get started I think you should just get a couple of 550s and leave it at that. Keep it simple and buy more stuff when you need to.

[IanHylands]

Jordan, there are a lot of different options available now for both Flash and RF Transceivers. You could check out www.radiopopper.com or the older pocket wizard plus' and as well there are the Paul Buff remotes that you mentioned. There are also a plethora of cheaper remotes that you can find online, but you get what you pay for and quality is important for some things. As far as flash options it is great to have a dedicated flash that works in TTL with your camera for some things, and if you're going to use something like the the radio popper px or the new pocket wizard you might consider getting a few Canon flashes. Both of these remote systems allow you to make use of full TTL control of your flashes as well as manually adjusting each flash individually from the remote. If you simply want to trigger a remote flash and don't mind manually adjusting everything you can definitely save a lot of money and buy cheaper flashes from a company like Vivitar and others. You can also purchase much cheaper remotes that don't have the flash control function, something like the radio popper jrx or the pocket wizard plus.

I'll be covering a few of these topics in more detail in a few upcoming tutorials. I'll keep you posted.

[Photo-John]

Thanks a lot for jumping in here, Ian. When it comes to flash stuff, you're one of the guys I think really knows it in and out. It's good to finally rope you into posting something here, too - even if it is on the Canon forum

[gahspidy]

I have two 580EXll speedlites and a Vivitar285HV as an background or just extra flash. The 580EXll are excellent and are the only Canon speedlites that I know that have pc sync terminal for plugging in your radio RX. otherwise you would need to purchase hotshoe adaptors from flashzebra.com.
The 580EXll are super powerful and recycle incredibly fast. they also get alot of go on a set of rechargeable AA NiMH batteries.
I use the Cybersync TX and RX specifically the battery powered units. These are the ones from Paul C. Buff maker of the Whitel lightening and AlienBees.
These units work excellent and I have used them in various situations now without ever a problem Much cheaper than the expensive PW and surely a better alternative to the cheap chinese made radiopoppers on ebay.

[Grandpaw]

If you happen to want to use a Vivitar flash such as the 283 or 285 on your camera hot shoe or directly connected to your camera make sure it has the HV behind the number or it may fry your camera. They look exactly alike but the non HV model puts out over 200volts to trigger the flash. The only difference in looks is the HV on the end of the number. The HV version can be used on digital cameras, Jeff

[Anbesol]

Just wanted to interject about the fear of line-of-sight with Canon's IR control - the IR receivers are actually very sensitive and very responsive, I've used both IR and RF control extesnively and found they both work very reliably, IR even more so when you consider the resetting of RF channels. The only problem I have even heard of with IR control is in bright outdoor sun. In a room with indoor lights (even very bright lights), I can have my lights several feet behind me, covered by diffuser/softbox, hiding in the back and the IR will still trigger perfectly every time.

[OldClicker]

I agree on the usefulness of the IR. It does not need a direct line of site. If the flash of the built in flash bothers you, cover it with a piece of exposed film - the IR will not be blocked. Careful using the pop up flash, though, because it will melt the film. Stinks. - TF

[gahspidy]

I agree about the usefullness of the IR signal and being able to wirelessly transmit E-TTL info to your remote speedlites.
However, I have run into problems with the IR range and being able to connect at times.
In my studio, there seems to be no limitations other than having them separated by a wall or something. I did run into trouble while on a location shoot in an old warehouse that had steel supports and roofing as well as roll up doors. I'm not sure what caused the problems with the IR working, but I had my Speedlites within several feet of the transmitting unit with nothing in between them and had the receiving postion of the flashes swiveled to face the transmitter and still had troubles. I have found that on and off, depending on siutation i could not count on the signal.
There was also a shoot that needed me to fire a flash that was behind a wall to hit the subject in a door opening, and i could not even think about doing that with the IR.
I have since bought the Cybersync radio tx/ rx's and fire all my flashes in manual mode. I'm much happier as it opened up so many more possibilities on location shoots.
The IR is great, in an ideal situation.