Nikon D70 slave flash trigger problem

Thread view:

Enable EMail Alerts

Start New Thread

Thread rating:

Andy Dee - 19 Feb 2006 15:09 GMT

I have been trying to use my Vivitar 283 flash with a small, optical,
slave trigger to throw extra light onto the background sheet.
I have used this many times in the past with my film SLR and it used to
work great.
However, with the D70, the light output from the flash does not appear
in the exposure. The flash fires, as far as I can tell, at the same time
as the camera flash.
I have confirmed this by actually photographing the flash unit, which
appears dark.
I have tried shutter speeds of up to 1/8 Sec but still the same.

I have a cheap digital camera (Kodak DX3600) and the slave works OK with it.

Any idea what is going on, this has me stumped..

Andy

Reply to this Message

Aad - 19 Feb 2006 16:20 GMT

>I have been trying to use my Vivitar 283 flash with a small, optical,
> slave trigger to throw extra light onto the background sheet.
[quoted text clipped - 13 lines]
>
> Andy

Your Nikon probebly fires a pre-flash for measurments. (its fast, you can't
see it)
So if you want to use a slave, you need a slave that fires on the second
(actual) flash.
Mayne your Nikon flash can be set in 'manual'. That might help.
Aad

Reply to this Message

tomm42 - 19 Feb 2006 17:50 GMT

What are you using for a synch speed, there maybe enough delay in the
flash/slave trigger that using one of the higher speeds 1/250 or 1/500
of a second maybe too fast. Most of these systems are built for a 1/60
or 1/30 of a second synch speed. I'd agree in setting the flash to
manual. In a confined setting running manually is easy to do.

Tom

Reply to this Message

Alan Browne - 19 Feb 2006 19:46 GMT

> I have been trying to use my Vivitar 283 flash with a small, optical,
> slave trigger to throw extra light onto the background sheet.
[quoted text clipped - 10 lines]
>
> Any idea what is going on, this has me stumped..

Fire the camera flash in manual-flash mode (if it is possible on your
camera) so the pre-flash (flash metering) does not kick your vivitar
before the shutter opens.

If the camera can't be set to turn off the pre-flash, then maybe you can
mount an older Nikon flash unit to the camera. It should only fire when
your shutter is fully open and then your slave will go off at the right
time.

Or, if the D70 has a sync cable port, then wire up your vivitar to that
(or via PocketWizards or similar).

There are also slaves that do not fire the remote flash on a first flash
pulse (assumes it's the pre-flash) but wait until the succeeding one.

Cheers,
Alan.

Signature

-- r.p.e.35mm user resource: http://www.aliasimages.com/rpe35mmur.htm
-- r.p.d.slr-systems: http://www.aliasimages.com/rpdslrsysur.htm
-- [SI] gallery & rulz: http://www.pbase.com/shootin
-- e-meil: Remove FreeLunch.

Reply to this Message

Andy Dee - 20 Feb 2006 17:25 GMT

> I have been trying to use my Vivitar 283 flash with a small, optical,
> slave trigger to throw extra light onto the background sheet.
[quoted text clipped - 12 lines]
>
> Andy

Thanks guys..
There is indeed a pre-flash from the D70 that was triggering the slave.
I managed to find the manual settings for the flash in the menus and
this enabled the slave to work...

Andy

Reply to this Message