Camera Advice

[Hacksawbob]

The remote flash triggers work off the old school principle of coining two contacts together. They take their signal from the hot shoe contacts and relay to a second receiver which does the same thing on the flash contacts. Although I'm not familiar with that particular model that is usually the way they work.

[jinnantonnixx]

The remote flash triggers work off the old school principle of coining two contacts together. They take their signal from the hot shoe contacts and relay to a second receiver which does the same thing on the flash contacts. Although I'm not familiar with that particular model that is usually the way they work.

 

That's exactly how they work, for the basic ones at least. The Yongnuo remotes I bought can only cope with a trigger voltage of up to 12 volts, so you've got to be very careful plugging in old flashguns. Two of my guns are 6v, but another of mine I measured at 190v. For this, I have to use an old fashioned strobe sensor. Not a huge deal, but you have to have a line of sight.

 

The ETTL remotes are a whole different story, and lots more cash.

 

As for Canon flash, I have an old 420EX and I wasn't impressed. The build quality of the Sunpaks are much better than the Canon, but then the Sunpaks are professional grade. Perhaps newer Canon flashes have improved, the 420EX is an amateur flash in any case.

Edited May 29, 2013 by jinnantonnixx

[CESIL]

Always a good idea to get down on the same level as your subjects baby's means on the floor

 

Ben

It always make me laugh that when someone asks me to take photos for them and I crouch down to get a good angle they invariably say something like "ohh, looks like we have a professional here"

 

My favourite was when I was taking pics of my son and his friends at their graduation and I was referred to by another guy's mum as "a professional dad"! I was slightly less happy that when I sent her a link to my gallery of the photos she downloaded the lot and then posted them on her facebook page without any reference to who took them...

[teejay]

Well, in the end I've ordered the Yongnuo YN568EX and the Yongnuo YN-622C Wireless TTL flash triggers, which combined were cheaper than just the 430EX II. They're through Amazon so I've got a few days to have a play and if I don't like them then send them back.

[SteveBentley]

I'm ok on a bright, sunny days but on overcast days or if we are in woods then I'm struggling especially with action shots as it drops down to too low a shutter speed to catch the action properly.

 

Let's just take a step back here (and apologies if I'm teaching grandmother to suck eggs) and check that you're not shooting in auto mode? I'd probably go for Aperture Priority and set that to the biggest (smallest f-number) aperture you can. If that's not enough to get a clear shot, ramp up the ISO as far as you need to, but be aware that it might get grainy if you go too high, but you should get away with at least 800.

 

I wonder if, rather than a flash, a reflector might help? You can "pop up" ones that aren't too big a hassle to carry.

 

For the colour issue, have you manually set the white balance?

[teejay]

I've done a full factory reset on my camera and that seems to have sorted out the green problem when shooting in jpeg, I think in RAW it's down to my lack of experience/skill in RAW processing. Roll on tomorrow when the new toys arrive

[teejay]

Finally got chance to have a play with the flash and the wireless triggers, they both work very well. Took a bit of figuring out, the manuals are really useless especially for someone who hasn't a clue with flashes:rolleyes:

Will test them properly next weekend, Mac has been in for the snip so he's on lead walks only at the moment so can't get any action shots.