Camera Flash Advice

[makario]

Hello Everyone,

I am looking at picking up an external flash for my canon 350D camera and I was hoping for some advice/learnings from the forrum on external flashes.

I am tending towards the canon 430EX as I can use it as a slave to a future 580 flash (should I get better at this).

Thanks
Cheers
Mak

[mR_CaESaR]

as i posted in a previous thread:

http://photonotes.org/articles/eos-flash/

Great article for Canon flash systems. A bit of a read, but there's a lot of great information there.

[makario]

Ta! I have read through the information there and it is very detailed. I think I should vist my local camera shop and have a play with the flash.

Cheers
Mak

[mR_CaESaR]

have you considered the sigma super 500 flash? I've heard pretty good things about it, some say its pretty much the same as the 550EX, although it just doen'st have the same build as the canons.

Might be worth looking into cos i think you can get it for the same price as the 430EX and you can almost get 2 sigma's for the price of 1 canon 580EX.

I was so close to getting 2 sigma's to play around with master/slave combo's but i decided to go with canon just purely of the fact that its canon (probably something i'm sort of regretting now as now i want another flash to play with master/slave and the canon's are quite expensive )

[makario]

I have seen a few reviews on the Sigma 500, but that was awhile ago. I will do some research on this

Ta!
Cheers
Mak

[DaveB]

I think the 430EX is a good choice. Certainly it's miles ahead of the 420EX in terms of configurability.

Between the 430EX and the 580EX, the 430 has a bit less power and lacks the ability to be a wireless master. But if this is your first flash I think that's a reasonable compromise. I used a 420EX for years, and still use it today as a slave.

As for the Sigma E-TTL flashes, there are at least two issues I'm aware of:

• They do not react to the 1.6x crop factor of the 350D.
  A 430EX or 580EX flash will set the zoom appropriately and not waste flash power illuminating the sides of the scene that the sensor will not see (this can amount to an extra stop of power).
• Last time I tested, hi-speed (FP) sync can be enabled to allow shooting above your sync speed, but in the Sigma flashes this mode is automatically turned off when the shutter speed drops below X-sync and needs to be manually re-enabled. This is a pain when working in Av-priority mode!

It was a few years ago I looked at the Sigma options though.

[makario]

Thanks Dave,

Being my first flash and since I have to pick one up before a potraiture workshop in May I dont want to break the bank, yet get something that is good to get me started and can be leveraged in the future. Hence my choice...

At this point I am leaning towards the 430EX.

Cheers
Mak

[petal666]

[*]Last time I tested, hi-speed (FP) sync can be enabled to allow shooting above your sync speed, but in the Sigma flashes this mode is automatically turned off when the shutter speed drops below X-sync and needs to be manually re-enabled. This is a pain when working in Av-priority mode!
It was a few years ago I looked at the Sigma options though.

Pretty sure this still occurs.