Fill flash with the Canonet

<p>My understanding of how the Canonet 28 exposure works in the manual mode is that when the aperture ring is moved from A, the shutter speed drops to 1/30 sec. I plan to use a manual flash which brings up several questions. First, if the shutter speed is fixed and the aperture is set manually, how is the exposure for ambient light set? Second, I have a chart on the back of my flash that lists the f stop vs. distance vs. ASA. I assume this chart is for the 1/60 sec. shutter speed and needs to be reworked for 1/30 sec? Third, is 1/30 sec fast enough for hand held photos in daylight with fill flash?</p>

<p>The chart on the back of your flash has nothing to do with shutter speed, well other than the sync speed. Some cameras sync at 125, some at 60 and some at 45. Of course these are not all the speeds but most of the common ones. With a set shutter speed you really don't have anyway to control ambient light. <br>

1/30 should be fast enough if you are steady. The lens is only a 40mm.</p>

 

 

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<p>With a set shutter speed you really don't have anyway to control ambient light.</p>

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<p> My Vivitar 200 is a small thyristor flash. The good thing is that it fires. With an ASA 100 film it lists f/5.6 up to 10 ft. So I set the aperture on the camera at f/5.6 and take the camera outside. Is it gonna work?</p>

<p>Brian, first of all: the aperture ring has no influence on the shutter speeds, that are governed by the shutter speed ring. If you move the aperture ring from A, the camera will no longer automatically adjust the aperture to the speed you selected, and will rather fire at whatever aperture/speed are set.<br>

Also, the Canonet has a central shutter and as such it is automatically synched with any electronic flash at any speed you select. 1/30 is only compulsory when using bulb flash.<br>

If you use a flash other than the dedicated Canonlite D, you should :<br>

- set the speed you intend to use<br>

- if you know the guide number of your flash, set the aperture ring to the the corresponding number engraved in blue (on the right side of the "A"). The camera will then automatically set the aperture as a function of the distance. Please note however that this is calculated for ASA 100 film.<br>

- If you cannot get the guide number or/and use a different sensitivity film, use the chart you mentioned to calculate the aperture and set is manually.<br>

- If you have selected a speed/aperture combination that would not produce a good shot given the distance, the shutter will not fire.</p>

 

<p>Briabn, I apologise profusely for my previous post. I assumed that the Canonet 28 was basically the same as the 17 but for the lens, but I was wrong. All the above refers to the 17 and is thus of no interest to you.<br>

I can confirm that if you move the ring from "A", the shutter will set at the flash syncro speed of 1/30. The aperture must be set manually by dividing the flash's guide number by the distance (in meters). Otherwise you can use the chart on the back. The camera will not fire if the aperture is too low or too high based on the distance.</p>

 

<p>No issues, Bonsignore. Thank you. I sensed that's what you were talking about.The problem is if I set the aperture at 5.6, I may be satisfying the flash but not necessarily ambient exposure. The answer may well be that that's what I get with a manual flash. Anyway, I will try different combinations and see what happens. I can get a Canolite for not much money. </p>

<p>As the manual says, flash photography with a Canonet 28 is <strong>for nighttime or indoor use only</strong>. The 1/30 shutter speed is too low to really be usable outdoors except with slow films. The Canonet 28's shutter is normally program-controlled only, unlike the Canonet QL 17 on which you can select any shutter speed. The only way to select a particular speed on the 28 is to mount something in the hot shoe, which selects 1/30. So, if you mount your flash and select f/5.6 with ASA 100 film and go out on a sunny day:<br /> Sunny 16 says you should have 1/125 at f/16 with 100 speed film. So, your shots would be 5 stops overexposed (1/125 --> 1/60 -->1/30 and f/5.6 --> f/8 --> f/11 --> f/16).</p>

<p>The 28 isn't a camera for daylight fill-flash, sadly. There were other cameras of that era which worked this way -- I have a few, the Fujica GEr and Olympus 35 ECR among them -- and they automatically set a slow shutter speed when using flash. This was called the "Flash-matic" system, whereby the camera adjusts the f stop according to the focus distance and the guide number of the flash. It works well, as long as the scene is lit completely by flash.</p>

<p>And as Clay says above, the chart on your Vivitar 200 applies to whatever the sync speed is for whatever camera you're using. It would be 1/30 on this camera, or it could be 1/8 to 1/500 on a Canonet QL17. The flash duration is much shorter than any of these speeds.</p>

<p>Clear as mud?</p>

<p>Specifics on the Canonet 28 can be found in the manual on Butkus's site (bless him):<br>

http://www.butkus.org/chinon/canon/canon_canonet_28/canon_canonet_28.htm <br>

It includes instructions on using the unit with the Canolite D.</p>

<p>On speeds, etc. see the above comments</p>

<p>So how would Canolite solve this problem? What is the communication between the camera and the flash like?</p>

<p>It's been years since I had the Canonet 28 and Canolite D, but as I recall the Canolite has a fixed output. The Canonet 28 adjusts the aperture based on the guide number/distance method. Just an automated version of how the Canonet GIII QL17 worked with the Canolite or any other flash, when the guide number was set via the tab on the lens.</p>

<p>The Canonet 28 had a nice lens and I preferred the standard knurled focus ring over the GIII QL17's knuckle-lever doodad. But the 28 was a pain in the neck otherwise. I like well designed autoexposure, like the Canon AF35, but the 28 had dopey automation.</p>

This isn't an easy thing to do.

 

 

The guide number / f-stop / distance

relationship of the flash is meant for

dark situations, not for fill. Basically

the power of the flash is fixed, so you

set the the f-stop to adjust how much

light is exposed, but it depends on how

much light is reflected back off the

subject, which is a function of distance.

 

 

Or, if you have an automatic thyristor

flash, the flash will adjust, but based on

a fixed aperture, and in most cases this

is f5.6 or higher.

 

 

Now for ambient exposure, you may

want to shoot wide open, with a slow

shutter speed, but even that isn't

enough, since you still need flash, only

"not too much" flash.

 

 

So how much flash is just right? Even

if you have a manual flash that can be

adjusted to 1/2, 1/4, 1/8, 1/16, or 1/32

power, there's no easy way to estimate

what setting to use. You need a DSLR

just for trial and error.

 

 

What you really need for fill flash is

TTL flash exposure. Either that or

modeling lights, or turn on a bright

lamp.