How does wireless remote flash work?

How do the master and slave flashes talk to each other? IR? Radio?
Bluetooth? Ken Rockwell explains it as, "Your camera triggers and controls
the other flashes by magic", but I assume that's just a figure of speech :-)

In article , Roy Smith
wrote:

How do the master and slave flashes talk to each other? IR? Radio?
Bluetooth? Ken Rockwell explains it as, "Your camera triggers and controls
the other flashes by magic", but I assume that's just a figure of speech :-)

I preferred radio slaves, but also used infrared in the studio. For
general use, I'd recommend radio.

In article ,
Randall Ainsworth wrote:

In article , Roy Smith
wrote:

How do the master and slave flashes talk to each other? IR? Radio?
Bluetooth? Ken Rockwell explains it as, "Your camera triggers and controls
the other flashes by magic", but I assume that's just a figure of speech :-)

I preferred radio slaves, but also used infrared in the studio. For
general use, I'd recommend radio.

Hmmm. OK, I guess I wasn't very specific (my bad). How does the Nikon
SB-600/800 series work?

According to Roy Smith :
In article ,
Randall Ainsworth wrote:

In article , Roy Smith

[ ... ]

I preferred radio slaves, but also used infrared in the studio. For
general use, I'd recommend radio.

Hmmm. OK, I guess I wasn't very specific (my bad). How does the Nikon
SB-600/800 series work?

Now that we are narrowed to a system which I use, I'll comment.

That, I believe, works by IR communications. The D70 has an IR
port (used by the remote control), and the SB-800 has a deep red window
on one side, which suggests that it, also, pays attention to pulsed IR
information.

The manuals (of course) don't really make it clear. :-)

Enjoy,
DoN.

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In article ,
(DoN. Nichols) wrote:

Hmmm. OK, I guess I wasn't very specific (my bad). How does the Nikon
SB-600/800 series work?

Now that we are narrowed to a system which I use, I'll comment.

That, I believe, works by IR communications. The D70 has an IR
port (used by the remote control), and the SB-800 has a deep red window
on one side, which suggests that it, also, pays attention to pulsed IR
information.

Which means you need to have line of sight between the master and the
slave(s), right?

I'm thinking of things like my IR remotes for thinks like TVs and DVRs; if
you don't have the remote pointed in the right direction, the device
doesn't see it. And any obstruction (say, a strategically placed cat)
blocks the signal too.

Does this line-of-sight issue exist with the Nikon flashes?

Is there also some way to pair-up one master with one slave, or do they all
talk to anything that's in range? Let's say me and a friend are in the
same area and we both have remote flashes set up. Will we be constantly
triggering each other's units by accident?

Roy Smith writes:

In article ,
(DoN. Nichols) wrote:

Hmmm. OK, I guess I wasn't very specific (my bad). How does the Nikon
SB-600/800 series work?

Now that we are narrowed to a system which I use, I'll comment.

That, I believe, works by IR communications. The D70 has an IR
port (used by the remote control), and the SB-800 has a deep red window
on one side, which suggests that it, also, pays attention to pulsed IR
information.

Which means you need to have line of sight between the master and the
slave(s), right?

I'm thinking of things like my IR remotes for thinks like TVs and DVRs; if
you don't have the remote pointed in the right direction, the device
doesn't see it. And any obstruction (say, a strategically placed cat)
blocks the signal too.

Yes, line-of-sight. I haven't tested extensively, but the manuals on
my D200 and SB800 make that pretty clear, they give angle limits and
such on how the SB800 must be within "sight" of the D200 on-camera
flash to use that as the commander, for example.

Does this line-of-sight issue exist with the Nikon flashes?

Yes, so far as I can see.

I've seen some discussions of using additional flashes to relay, with
a snoot or such to avoid affecting the lighting. Apparently this
works. It's pretty kludgy, if I had to do a lot of it I'd start to
resent it.

Is there also some way to pair-up one master with one slave, or do they all
talk to anything that's in range? Let's say me and a friend are in the
same area and we both have remote flashes set up. Will we be constantly
triggering each other's units by accident?

I haven't tried with multiple masters to see if what I think actually
happens, but there's no step where you associate equipment with each
other, so I don't think they can distinguish.

(There's a separate, very useful, thing where you can divide flashes
into groups, and control the output of each group from the commander.)
--
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Pics: http://dd-b.lighthunters.net/ http://www.dd-b.net/dd-b/SnapshotAlbum/
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"Roy Smith" wrote in message
...
SNIP
Which means you need to have line of sight between the master
and the slave(s), right?

In bright light surroundings, yes. However when there is less ambient
light, reflected IR may also work.

Bart

According to Roy Smith :
In article ,
(DoN. Nichols) wrote:

Hmmm. OK, I guess I wasn't very specific (my bad). How does the Nikon
SB-600/800 series work?

Now that we are narrowed to a system which I use, I'll comment.

That, I believe, works by IR communications. The D70 has an IR
port (used by the remote control), and the SB-800 has a deep red window
on one side, which suggests that it, also, pays attention to pulsed IR
information.

Which means you need to have line of sight between the master and the
slave(s), right?

Well ... not totally. You can bounce the IR off of convenient
surfaces. I've been known to aim the TV remote at the wall above my
shoulder to get around someone standing in the path.

Yes -- you need line-of-sight if you are outdoors with nothing
convenient from which to bounce the signals, but indoors, unless the
walls are quite dark, you can probably bounces the signals around
without problems.

I'm thinking of things like my IR remotes for thinks like TVs and DVRs; if
you don't have the remote pointed in the right direction, the device
doesn't see it. And any obstruction (say, a strategically placed cat)
blocks the signal too.

For me, at least, the controller signals bounce nicely from
walls and other things.

Does this line-of-sight issue exist with the Nikon flashes?

Potentially -- when outdoors or in a *very* large building, with
no crowd around to bounce the signals from.

Is there also some way to pair-up one master with one slave, or do they all
talk to anything that's in range? Let's say me and a friend are in the
same area and we both have remote flashes set up. Will we be constantly
triggering each other's units by accident?

The flash has four channels (1, 2, 3 and 4) and three groups (A,
B, and C). The D70 must work on channel 3 (there is no way to change
it), but you still have the three groups to select from. This applies
if you are using the D70 as the Master flash. If, instead, you have an
SB-800 on the D70, and are talking to other SB-800 or SB-600 flash units
around the room, you can use any channel there, because the SB-800 flash
on the camera is the Master, instead of the pop-up flash on the camera.
(You can use the groups to trigger multiple flashes illuminating
different parts of the subject area -- but for simple work, you would
use them to keep from interacting with your friend's setup -- unless
you have four or more cameras in the same area using the "commander".
mode.)

I have not yet checked whether the D200 is capable of being the
Master in other channels than just channel 3. My manual for the SB-800
predates the D200.

Enjoy,
DoN.
--
Email: | Voice (all times): (703) 938-4564
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On 18 May 2006 00:47:50 GMT, (DoN. Nichols)
wrote:


Hmmm. OK, I guess I wasn't very specific (my bad). How does the Nikon
SB-600/800 series work?

Here is one that I have never seen asked or answered anywhere.

Say you have a mix of SB-800/600s and older Nikon speedlights.

Can you use a wired connection (SC-18/19, etc) to slave an older flash
off a wireless SB-800/600 slave?

I realize you won't get that full control over the older speedlight,
but if you don't mind doing manual settings, it might just be OK.

Father Kodak

Father Kodak wrote:

Can you use a wired connection (SC-18/19, etc) to slave an older flash
off a wireless SB-800/600 slave?

I'm almost positive that you can't. I know you can't with an SB-600.

I realize you won't get that full control over the older speedlight,
but if you don't mind doing manual settings, it might just be OK.

You can get an optical slave trigger with a flash hot shoe to trigger
the older flashes. I've heard that there exist such things as optical
slaves that know to ignore the "pre-flash", and those might work along
with the shiny hi-tech wireless thingy. But I haven't tried it, myself.
Full manual is, to me, a whole lot easier than the hi-tech magic, which
frankly got real old after just playing with it a bit. You pay about
as much for one of those SB-800s as you would for a real strobe unit,
so the whole thing seems gimmicky and not worth it to me.

--
Jeremy |