laughing buddha production

<p><strong>Question: Do low internal batteries cause the SB-800 to exhibit symptoms like AF-Illum not firing, zoom head not moving, in addition to slow recycle and going into Standby mode.</strong><br>

Could not find any other thread with this info. Thanks for any input...<br>

Situation: I use the SB-800 with a D700, and use a few different Quantums to power the high-voltage part of the flash. I use Maha Powerex 2700 AA's to power the -800's internal circuitry. Often I shoot long events and later in the evening I'll get some symptoms in the SB-800 such as:<br>

1) the AF-Illum won't fire in low light situations when it normally would (I know to put the camera on AF-S, etc.)<br>

2) the zoom head does not Auto-Zoom (again, assume that I have the settings correct) and won't even display the current focal length.<br>

3) flash goes into Standby even when Auto-Standby is turned off*<br>

*I know this is a clear sign of low, or near depleted internal AA's. But this symptom comes right at the end.<br>

Since I'm using a Quantum, I don't experience any increase in flash recycle time - <strong>so are items #1 and #2 early signs of low AA batteries or might it be something else</strong> (loose connection w hotshoe) these things symptoms of low internal batteries.<br>

Thank you in advance for your input.</p>

<p>I have the older 85 Tilt-Shift and it was very easy to modify it so the Tilt and Shift are both along the same axis. A small Philips screwdriver, turn the lens 90 degrees, and screw back together. Three minutes and it's all done. I did not have any issue with the electronic connector cable - apparently, mine was long enough to accommodate the modification.</p>

<p>Thank you Frank for your input.</p>

<p>I did reach Quantum and it's a known issue with the Turbo-Z and the SB-800 on SU-4 mode. They have a free fix - a circuit upgrade - and I've got my Turbo-Z's in the shop for that and some new cells.</p>

<p>Here's the text of the email from their tech:</p>

<p>"We have a free update that will take care of the problem with the Speedlight in the SU4 mode. It is something caused when the unit is placed into that mode, that interferes with the power coming in from the battery."</p>

<p>Could not find anything on this, so here goes...</p>

<p>SETUP: Set up a SB-800 as a remote, off-camera flash. Attached a Quantum Turbo Z battery with the standard Quantum CKE cable to the hi-voltage port of the SB-800. Set the SB-800 to SU-4 Mode, on Manual power of 1/16, to be triggered when the on-camera flash fired.</p>

<p>PROBLEM: When I turned on the Turbo Z with the set-up above. The SB - 800 started firing uncontrollably, as fast as it would recycle, non-stop. Only turning the flash or Turbo Z off stops this. This error does not occur under other SB-800 settings (Master, remote) - only on SU-4 mode.<br>

This problem happened with any one of several SB-800's and both my Turbo Z's, but NOT the regular Turbo.</p>

<p>Any thoughts?</p>

<p>Good luck. I wasn't necessarily trying to get a 'new' lens either. But for the $$$, I expect a professional grade piece of equipment that will perform under all kinds of conditions. For a lens like that to exhibit such show-stopping issues was unacceptable for me as a professional photographer. So I continued to send it in until it came back in a condition where it performed to expectations.</p>

<p>With mine there was all kinds of replacement of parts and tune-ups as they tried to diagnose and correct the issue, which ultimately they were unable to do.</p>

<p>Keep at it - I hope you'll get satisfaction in the end! It is a great lens and having a reliable copy now reminds me that none of us should put up with something substandard - especially when you shell out $2k for it.</p>

 

<p>I had a similar problem with the exact same lens. In addition to loud clunking noises, the lens would suddenly lose AF ability and the focus would just drift aimlessly. And then some shots would come out 'black' essentially the lens stopped down to the smallest aperture instead of the f-stop I selected. This would usually happen after a period of heavy use - say at least 30 minutes, but often an hour or more.</p>

<p>I sent it into Melville three times, each time they were unable to consistently reproduce the problem and thought it might be the VR or a contact issue - the lens falling out of contact with the camera. Very frustrating to wait 10 days (and I'm NPS) for my lens and then experience the same failure the same day I receive it - after playing with the lens for 30-60 min.</p>

<p>Finally after three tries they gave me a new copy of the lens and it's worked fine since then - knock on wood. It sucks, but just keep sending it back until they get it right.</p>

 

<p>I've become a big fan of the Newton Brackets (http://www.newtoncamerabrackets.com/) after using a couple of different Stroboframes. My biggest issue is their bulkiness when trying to pack them and general awkwardness in using them (specifically the camera-flip and VH-2000 version). I use a CB bracket sometimes as well, the Mini-RC, which is limited in it's use since it just moves the flash to the right of the lens.</p>

<p>The Newton Flash Rotator Bracket is elegant, sleek, folds, and is well designed with nice beveled edges and just looks very professional.</p>

<p>I agree with everyone that the choice of a bracket is a very personal thing. I've tried a few different things and this Newton feels right for me. Good luck!</p>

<p>I was at the Bryant Park Fashion week and saw a guy on the other side of the room using a camera with TWO speedlights on it. One was a Quantum Q-flash of some type, angled off to the side for bounce. The other looked like a standard Canon 580 pointed forward.</p>

<p>Didn't get a chance to talk to him. But I shoot a lot of events and have been thinking about a similar rig. I always like to point the flash to side/back - anywhere to get some bounce and DIRECTIONALITY rather than flat straight on flash. I find off the ceiling often leaves harsh shadows on the eyes. I'm a big fan of Neil van Neikerk's approach.</p>

<p>So I can see using a more powerful Quantum as the main light - but angled off the best surface for some directionality to it. Then using a Nikon SB-800 straight ahead, dialed down say -2.0 EV for fill. I could even use 2 SB-800's but can see a power advantage to the Q-flash. I guess you could use 2 x SB-800 and have one be the commander, one remote would be pretty straightforward.</p>

<p>Has anyone used something like this? How well does it work? Any tips on connecting all the sync cords?</p>

<p>Any thoughts?</p>

<p> </p>

<p>I also want to add more info. I had a SB-800 D700 problem with my second D700. My first one went in to Melville as noted in an earlier post and they replaced the hotshoe. This one is at the shop here in NY and they can't seem to duplicate the problem. </p>

<p>I did not have the rapid flashes this time, just some random errors in the flash output. I could see when chimping that in TTL mode the exposures were way off, usually too much flash. Then sometimes the flash would NOT fire. Hmmm. Sounds like another semi-loose hotshoe. I wonder if the next symptom will be that short and the involuntary spastic flashing of the SB.</p>

<p>Oh well, the tech is taking another look and I'll keep you posted. Someone else on FM just referred me to a DP review story as well - the home of the plier crimp rescue method. http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/readflat.asp?forum=1021&message=33207948</p>

<p>I've got a Quantum T-2 and a few SB-800's to use with D700's. Frankly, the Quantum just collects dust on my shelf. It's marginally more powerful in output vs the SB-800, but it's just too difficult to incorporate into my normal working routine. It would require the adapters/plates that Adam mentions, then you lose TTL capability. Or if you're using it off camera, the most realistic way of triggering it is with a Pocket Wizard or similar. I would do what the other guys said, spend the money on another Nikon flash and you'll find your capabilities pretty much the same with much better control integration.</p>

<p>Hi David,</p>

<p>I had a similar experience with my 70-200 VR version 1. It worked fine for about a month (I'm a full-time freelancer so the lens gets quite a workout.) I noticed some frames came out essentially black - with the lens stopped completely down for the shot. At the same time, I lost AF - the lens seemed to slowly cam one way or another - then the VF showed F0. Metering was of as well, going to spot or center weighted when I was on Matrix.</p>

<p>The VR also seemed to jump around noisily and get stuck sometimes.</p>

<p>Apparently, some loose contacts resulted in a fallout in communication between the camera and this results in the lens getting stuck stopped down and the other issues with AF and metering (though you did not mention AF issues.)</p>

<p>I sent said lens to Nikon Melville three times over 18 months whenever the problem got out of hand - occurring say 10% of the time. Unacceptable in my job. They replaced and tuned up a bunch of circuits and other things and the lens worked fine for a while, then the problem reoccured and became more frequent; and the lens would go of to Melville again. Finally on the third time they replaced the lens. But it was a huge source of uncertainty for me.</p>

<p>Keep an eye on how frequently this occurs. Try to just unlock and slightly twist the lens, unseating and then reseating it. Turn the power on and off. This usually gets things 'reset.' Unfortunately in my experience it was a progressive problem that ultimately called for a lens replacement. I certainly hope your's is a one-off experience. But I do personally feel it's a connectivity issue between lens and camera - but Nikon never confirmed the cause of the error.</p>

<p>Michael</p>

<p>I may also be a hotshoe that needs to be replaced, especially if the SB-800 feels solidly mounted and the shorts still occur. I had a D200 but did not experience that problem, but I did have a similar problem with one of my D700's and SB_800s and a hotshoe replacement at Nikon solved it right away.</p>

<p>You might want to borrow someone else's Nikon SB and try it on your camera, just to verify it's a camera and not a flash issue.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Park, you should be able to get photos that are just fine with one on-camera flash. The 580 is a great piece of gear. The key when outdoors at night is to try and get some nice diffuse light on the subjects; and with no walls to bounce off of, any number of things like the Lumiquest, Fong Dong, or my favorite, the Demb Flip-it, can help soften the light. As well, shooting higher ISO, using slow sync, and trying to drag the shutter with a slow say 1/30 speed at ISO 1600/2000 can give you much better balance between flash and ambient, avoiding deer in headlights in a cave look of most amateur shots.</p>

<p>A bracket to raise the flash might help, but I find it excessive when paired with a diffusion device. The other option is to use the remote cord and get the flash off the camera for some sculpting and directionality. I just find this awkward since I have trouble holding the flash and stabilizing the camera, especially shooting at 1/30 or slower.</p>

<p>Hi Julie,<br>

I agree in general with most of the comments above. I would go with strobes as well, either speedlights or AC monolights would be fine. From the looks of the layout, I agree that you can probably cover Den & Doc with one bigger softbox and then a med box on the person by the blackboard. I recommend softboxes, maybe even with egg cartons/grids since the spill and directionality would be tighter than umbrellas and in keeping with your 'spots' of light idea. Umbrellas will throw light everywhere.<br>

So at minimum two lights, probably better with a third as Michael suggests with a large umbrella near the camera to boost ambient and fill as required. One more gridded strobe as a rim or separation light on Den's back or left side (camera left) would be a nice touch - so call it four lights - two softboxes, one umbrella, one 20-degree grid.<br>

Realize that you can do the whole setup with hot lights as well. Six of one... It's all personal preference and what you like to work with.<br>

Spend and hour setting up and get metered and dialed in, bring in the talent and there you go.<br>

Not lighting related but the example shot it cropped a bit tight. I would probably shoot it a bit wider to give the PE a bit more leeway in cropping it. And with the title on the bottom, you might want to underexpose that area to give less distraction.<br>

The DOF thing will be a possible issue, especially if you want the blackboard crisp and readable which might leave the foreground people a bit less sharp.<br>

Good luck.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Agreed that there is no 'general' setting that covers all situations. That being said, I shoot a lot of event work with the SB-800's and I've found for working indoors when you have a good bounce surface, I will usually shoot Manual on the camera, 1/40 f 4-5.6 with Rear Curtain Sync when I can use either light colored/white ceiling or walls that TTL works well at minus 1.0 to 1 2/3 EV. This has given me pretty consistently nice exposures where I'm picking up some of the natural/ambient light and the flash is not overpowering that but complimenting it. A good baseline to start from perhaps. I decide depending on the ambient light what an appropriate ISO is and let the camera decide how much flash power to throw out there - the Nikon systems do a pretty good job of metering (the minus 1.0EV notwithstanding).</p>

<p>I suggest bringing the 30mm and the 80-200mm and the mono for that. The telephoto will likely be your most used lens, depending on where you are situated. I'll refer you to a blog entry of mine where I talk about shooting a show at Bryant Park Mercedes Fashion Week.<br>

http://michaelseto.blogspot.com/2009/04/fashion-week-feb-2009-here-we-go-again.html</p>

 

<p>I have an HP Pavilion desktop m9040n. It came with two Western Digital 320 GB internal SATA drives. One disc is the C: drive with Windows XP and all my applications. The other is the D: drive, just storage.</p>

<p>I am going to buy a new WD Caviar Black 1TB drive to replace my current D: drive to add more storage space.</p>

<p><strong>QUESTION: When I open up my PC and take out the drive case, how do I know which of the two identical looking drives is C: and which is D: ? I don't want to replace the C: drive just the D: drive.</strong></p>

<p>Given the above information, is there any obvious hardware conflicts or other warnings I should be aware of? (I'm watched an HP video on how to physically replace the drives, so no issue there.)</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Also, if you dare, you can have Nikon adjust the SB-900 to remove the temperature triggered shutoff.</p>

<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>

<p>I was looking for a thread like this - glad to get more info on this issue. I shoot with 2 D700's; one about 15 months old (bought when they first launched); and a backup purchased this summer - a refurb.<br /> <br /> I use SB-800's on both and work the head of the flash left and right, up and down, pretty aggressively - change the bounce angle on almost every shot. I can tell the extra pressure over time feels like it's loosening the connection with the camera.<br /> <br /> And in the past couple weeks, I got the same problem you all describe: flash flickers on occasion, firing on it's own, sometimes the flash not firing - and the attendant Pocket Wizard won't trigger remotes (linked to camera by PC sync) as well. UGH. Both cameras seem to exhibit the same issue.<br /> <br /> Thought it might be one of the SB-800s, but all four of mine seem to have this issue, and another photog I worked with last night suggested it's a hotshoe problem - he had the same thing and sent his body into NPS.<br /> <br /> So anyway, just wanted to throw my 2c in here since there are only a couple threads that came up via Google last night. This definitely seems like and issue and I think it's important to get this info out there so others know about it...especially the folks at Nikon.<br /> <br /> I'm sending my cameras out to Melville first thing - hope I can get them back ASAP and give everyone interested in this issue an update. </p>

<p>Second FlashZebra - I have two of their SCREW LOCKING PC sync cords to mono-mini (Pocket Wizard) for my Nikon's - they work great, have various lengths and are not crazy overpriced for what you get. You'll have to carefully scroll through their site to find what you want; it's not the best organized, but good stuff. Screw locks beat gaff tape every time.</p>

<p>I use that particular lens on a D700, full frame, and for a while I had a UV filter mounted on it; it was a standard thickness filter. Never had any vignetting at 17mm. If I put a PL on it, I took the UV off, there was no vignetting either with the standard PL filter either.</p>

<p>Thanks for the answers gents, to clarify on the second issue. My hotshoe flash is powered by a Quantum Turbo SC, the remote is powered with a Quantum Turbo. I've seen when I push it too far vis-a-vis recycling issues - this looks nothing like that - I can tell that both flashes fail to fire. </p>

<p>So I wonder if the possible short/loose connection on the hotshoe is also flowing through to the the PC sync for some reason - are they tied together - one fail all fail?</p>

<p>Hi there, I experienced a problem for the first time with the SB-800. I have four of them and shoot with two D-700's - a lot of event work. I had a couple issues crop up the last two times I used this combo of gear.</p>

<p>Two of my SB-800's seemed to have connection issues (exhibited on both D700 bodies) - symptoms: sometimes the flash would fire on it's own; and when I wiggle the SB-800, I can sometimes get the flash to fire. I understand this is stemming from a likely loose connection or short with the center pin; correct me if I'm wrong.</p>

<p>Second, and more disconcerting, when shooting some dancing (D700 + SB-800 in camera hotshoe, then a Pocket Wizard synced to the PC port on the camera firing a remote SB-800 (set to manual 1/8 power, no Auto Standby). [Overall, I'm shooting the D700 in Manual, f8, 1/200, rear curtain sync, AF-S, single point, RAW, ISO 1600, at Continuous High, the hotshoe'd SB-800 on TTL -1.3 FV] </p>

<p><strong>Problem: </strong> About 3 in 50 shots both the on camera (hotshoe) SB-800 and the remote light DID NOT FIRE - I can tell by chimping and just seeing the lack of flash on my subject - and I'm wondering if this is a problem related to the loose hotshoe/loose connection to the SB. Or is this a symptom of something potentially more serious with the camera since the PC sync socket did not fire the Pocket Wizard and the remote flash? It usually occurs when I'm shooting at a pretty high FPS rate.</p>

<p>I tried cleaning the hotshoe contacts and the SB-800 contacts with an eraser. Still get the intermittent firings and failure to fire. I'm going to keep shooting for now and see if I can isolate the problem with the two bodies and two of four flashes.</p>

<p>Any thoughts on other ways to troubleshoot or address these issues? Otherwise, off to NPS for a diagnosis.</p>

<p>If you're shooting long exposure NR be sure to bring an extra battery, it can eat up power. Not sure what you will truly be able to brighten with just an SB-600, especially depending on how far the buildings are, but it can't hurt to have. Instead of a flashlight, maybe a more powerful spotlight.</p>

<p>You'll probably want to bracket and I'd even try to shoot a few HDR images.</p>

<p>Sounds like you pretty much are set. Flashlight/headlamp good idea. Gloves, wool cap, a folding stool to sit on.</p>