IS ANYONE FEELING CLEVER TONIGHT?

[FUJI]

Folks, I have a bit of a mystery...or....I am missing a simple setting:

 

As you know, I recently have made a great DIY Flash Diffuser.......I have two Speedlights that I want to use it on.

 

The first, is my very basic SUNPAK PF30X SONY ADI, this flash head just goes up and down.....For my usual flash photography I begin with ISO 100 ...F11 to F16...S 160.....Manual setting............as soon as I switch both camera and flash on, my LCD screen jumps into bright life especially if the light is middling to poor...this seems to happen automatically:

 

My other Speedlight is a more sophisticated (but reasonably priced)  YONGNUO DIGITAL SPEEDLIGHT YN460 for SONY.....this has three modes, and a fully rotatable and adjustable flash head.

 

The mystery.........This flash will only function at certain camera settings, and, my LCD screen doesn't brighten up, as with the other flash, a bit annoying because, for my Macro photography, that is exactly what I want.....I have tried this flash in all three modes and fiddled with camera settings:

 

The latter flash has a reasonable spec...both fire via remote cable, and can be triggered by another flash...I havent fiddled with my wireless flash triggers yet:

 

Am I missing something obvious???

 

FUJI

[Guest DaveW]

Yes Fuji, sounds like it is not a fully dedicated flashgun for your Sony. If you want full dedication you have to pay the price. Evidently your Sunpak has greater dedication for your camera, if less "bells and whistles" than the Yongnuo does. See:-

 

http://speedlights.net/2010/12/10/yongnuo-yn460-ii/

 

Many flashes fit onto the hotshoe and work with partial dedication, which makes for cheaper guns, but not all have full dedication unless they claim so, plus they are usually more expensive.  Gone are the days with hotshoes with only a single pin when all flashguns worked the same.  Dedicated is often misused in adverts sometimes meaning partial dedication.  If you want to be sure you are getting full dedication stick to well known brands like Sunpak, Nissin, Metz or the camera makers own brands. It does not look as if the Yongnuo can use all the forms of TTL flash metering on your camera either, but I have not read the above review in detail?

 

http://www.parkcameras.com/c/45/Sony-Compatible-Flashguns.html

 

Edit; just found this review for your flash:-

 

"Do not be fooled by the front of the flash, which seems to feature AF-assist beam, this is a full manual flash, and when mounted on your SLR/DSLR, it will fire off manually with no communication with your camera. An optical receiver is hosted inside the translucent red compartment at the front, which makes the flash an optical slave if needed. Since optical slave works on line of sight, the placement of this receiver might cause a lot of inconvenience due to the position of the flash to be placed."

 

http://blog.etanphotography.com/?p=1799

 

From the review, unless I have misread it, seemingly you  are back to the old pre-dedication days with a fully manual flash gun with no communication to the camera other than the flash trigger contact, but the ability to use it as an off camera slave? BP will probably know more about it.

Edited April 25, 2013 by DaveW

[FUJI]

Thanks for that Dave......all very informative and useful.......all is not lost, because both flashes fill the roles I intended them for and now that I'm aware of the limits I will use them accordingly.

By a strange coincidence, I got pretty well the same information from another keen photographer who happens to be our postie.

CHEERS!

FUJI

[Guest DaveW]

Your almost back to the days when we started Fuji with film cameras when you used guide numbers and the only connection to the camera hot shoe was the centre flash pin and the metal shoe itself.

 

http://www.f1point0.com/2008/06/22/the-nuts-and-bolts-of-off-camera-flash-part-2-manual-flash/

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IISO_flash_shoe