Nikon wireless speedlight commander

[marten_holmes]

<p>I'm using a D700 with two speedlights(800's) and am thinking of getting a remote trigger - is the SU800 the only one to consider? (It's expensive!)</p>

[Matt Laur]

<p>Well, the D700's pop-up is a free commander, in the sense that you already own it. One SB800 can also be in the hot shoe and trigger the other as a slave. OR, you can put the flashes in SU-4 mode (and manually set their power), and use <em>any</em> other flash to trigger them.<br /><br />And, of course, there are more radio trigger choices every day - some quite reasonable. But that will inexpensively give you full CLS control.</p>

[ilkka_nissila]

<p>Which radio triggers allow the power of remote flashes to be adjusted from the commander (with no flash on camera)? And which allow TTL on Nikon DSLRs? Thanks.</p>

<p>Personally I dislike the weight of a hot shoe flash on camera, so I use SU-800 (much lighter than an SB-800/900) or a pc cord to trigger my remote flashes. The radio triggers which I have seen don't even have a group / power control panel.</p>

[hans_janssen]

<p>Use the pop-up as commander and buy a SG3IR to block visiable light from that if necessary.</p>

[marten_holmes]

<p>Hans, does the SG3IR reduce the distance from camera to speedlight? What is the effective range?</p>

[Matt Laur]

<p>Ilkka: There are multiple upcoming PW products, though PW says they are much delayed, now - until 2010. They're still ironing out a lot of kinks in that system, last time I read anything about it. And for a transmitter and the receivers needed, anything they start shipping along those lines (assuming it works!) is still going to cost a lot more than an SU-800. It may be just iTTL, though, and only allow for EV adjustments, not full-on grouping. Regardless, there's nothing on the horizon in that area that will be <em>less</em> expensive than the SU-800.<br /><br />There <em>are</em> inexpensive radio solutions that can trigger the SB-800's, no problem - provided you don't mind adjusting power manually.</p>

[walterh]

<p>Marten quite happy with the Nikon SU800. You already know the steep price but might be of interest to know that it works well. I met or talked to several people who own this controller and none of these people gave me any complains. So if you want to do more than just trigger it may be worth while. Just for a trigger I would go cheap.</p>

[laughing buddha production]

<p>Ilkka, the Radio Poppers currently allow for radio facilitated TTL. I know they work with a SB-800 on the hot shoe - I don't know if they work with the SU-800. You'll have to check the specs at the site or maybe someone else will know. I would guess it works since the Radio Poppers work by picking up the IR transmission, turning it into radio and then reconverting to IR at the receiving end. So you would think that it can read the IR from both the SB- and the SU-800.</p>

[rubens_t_vora]

<p>Hi Walter, here is one of those that has observed 04 drawbacks over SU-800, ( I got one and 02 SBs)<br>

a) Infrared is not really a good technology if you compare to RF. I got problems loosing signal even in studio when umbrellas obstruct those pulses from SBs and SU-800. In bright sun light you can have the same problem. At this moments you get bored loosing time to reconfigure angles!<br>

b) the distance between commander and flashes are very restricted, again compared to any device RF.<br>

c) SU-800 has a fixed axis and you are not allowed to rotate and get better connection between commander and speedlights., again searching better signal <br>

d) This commander SU-800 will not fire monolights and other setups than Nikon.<br>

I am now watching some posts over radiopopper that could assemble strobes and speedlights ( multi-brand, and old oneswithout PC connector) <br>

Marten, be careful now and look for strobist and other reviews to make your final decision. Good Luck, Rubens</p>

[rubens_t_vora]

<p>Marten, I received a great help from Joseph S. Wisniewski . This guy can give you advanced aproach over this issue. Regards, Rubens<br>

<a href="http://www.photo.net/photodb/user?user_id=587835">http://www.photo.net/photodb/user?user_id=587835</a></p>

[kohanmike]

<p>I use the popup flash on a D70s with three SB600 flash units and find it to work very well, I'm sure it's probably the same with the D700. I don't find the popup flash to cause any exposure problems, which flashes slightly earlier to trigger the remote flashes.</p>

[dan_south]

<p>The main restriction with the built-in flash is that it transmits on only one channel and to only one group. With a dedicated commander unit you can set different groups to different power levels.</p>

<p>If you use the built-in flash to control remote Nikon speedlights, you'll have to adjust each unit's effective power by physically moving them closer to or farther from your subject. It's not a big deal. You just don't have the same level of remote control.</p>

[marten_holmes]

<p>Hmmm! Thanks for your answers and advice guys - this is obviously going to be a steeper learning curve than initially expected. I currently mainly shoot wedding and with the low light capabilities of the the D700 I don't use flash much other than for fill in. The times I do use it I normally put it in the hotshoe and bounce of anything and everything.<br>

However, I'm getting to do more portraits and looking to develop a broader style. At my grand old age I'm taking a foundation degree in photography (evening class) which gives me access to the studio and a portable lighting rig. Therefore, I don't have to rush into buying equipment as I can borrow stuff for the next couple of years, but obviously, I want to future proof any purchases I make now. I also like the idea of experimenting with such portable stuff as Speedlights - which I own anyway.<br>

I'm sure I'll be asking more questions as they occur to me!</p>

[alan_huett]

<p>Dan, the newer bodies allow you to control more than one group. My D90 allows two groups, the D700 also allows two. The SB800 or SU800 will allow three groups.<br>

In TTL mode moving the lights will not necessarily change the lighting intensity on the subject, since the power is controlled via the camera meter and pre-flashes, this will only work if you set the power level of the flashes in a non-TTL mode. In which case you can change the power remotely anyway from the camera.<br>

Marten, if you have two 800s I think you have enough lighting options already to keep you busy learning for a while (this has certainly been my own humbling experience). You might want to consider getting a TTL cord for one 800 and using it off-camera as a commander for the other. You then have more flexibility in placing the second light, since if it sees the subject it is likely to see the control pulses too. The Nikon TTL cords are not cheap (or very long), but third parties such as Calumet carry longer, cheaper models. Depending on where you want your lights, this can be a useful solution, especially if you work with your lights in close. The wireless TTL modes work well indoors, where the pre-flashes bounce around, but outside are more temperamental.<br>

Finally, you can move out of TTL mode entirely and use the SU4 mode of the 800s. This triggers the light in response to any other flash pulse, so you have to preset your power levels manually on the flash units. It is more sensitive than TTL since there are no control pulses and you can trigger it using your on-camera flash.<br>

I would do one of the above relatively cheap or free solutions and check back in 6 months or a year to see if RadioPoppers or Pocket Wizards have sorted out their solutions to your satisfaction (and budget). You will also have a far better idea of what you need from a TTL vs manual setup and how much fiddling with your remote flashes you can tolerate when "in the field".</p>

[ilkka_nissila]

<p><em>the Radio Poppers currently allow for radio facilitated TTL. I know they work with a SB-800 on the hot shoe</em></p>

<p>It is also reported to work with the SU-800, so that's good. But apparently they're not available as versions that can be used in Europe? Using GSM frequencies, that's just great planning... so basically nothing that can do CLS flash control with RF is available for Nikon users in Europe, is this correct?</p>

[marten_holmes]

<p>Ho hum! Guess where I live Ilkka - yep, UK.</p>