Help -- Best TTL Flash For D60 Camera?

[CJMORGAN59]

Long and the short of it is this: my results from using the Canon D60 & the Canon 550EX flash just suck (technically speaking) in terms of showing a great lack of consistency. It's like this camera and this flash just are not the most compatiable pair. Which leads to the question: What's the best TTL flash to use with a Canon D60 digtial camera?

Thanks In Advance,
CJ

[michaelchristensen]

Well sorry to say - Speedlight 550EX! I have a D30 and a 550 EX with no problems at all. I have spent a lot of time with the flash and now I am able to shoot some very nice shots with 550EX.

If you're not used to take pictures with flash, D30 and D60 is not the "best" cameras to learn it from.

See my flash pictures here : www.christensen.tv/d30.htm

And tjek this out :
http://photonotes.org/articles/eos-flash/

And this :
http://www.dlcphotography.net/CanonLetter.htm

Read and learn!

Regards

Michael

[gorham]

For me, it's the 420EX but I don't actually use flash a lot of the time. When I do, the 420 is easy and reliable and, when I need more from it, it's flexible enough to do things I haven't even thought of yet.

B&H describes it well:
http://www01.bhphotovideo.com/default.sph/FrameWork.class?FNC=ProductActivator__Aproductlist _html___206436___CA420EX___USA___CatID=0___SID=EFE FA600200

Ugh . If that link breaks up, go to bhphotovideo.com and search for "420ex".

Also at Canon:
http://www.usa.canon.com/html/cameras_speedlite/420ex.html

HTH.

Gorham

[jadams]

Does the D60 have a FEL (Flash Exposure Lock) button? On my 1D the 550EX is *usually* spot on -- but if I do FEL before, it's *always* spot on.

In my experience it's an amazing flash -- it does EVERYTHING. Did you ever shoot a photo outside at 1/16,000th of a second - ISO 100 - f/18 and get proper exposure? It's amazing how much the flash handles by itself.

Use Program Mode and FEL and you shouldn't have a problem. Or, I find (as above) that it's amazing what you can do with Manual. Stay away from Av and Tv unless you have a very specific need -- they do "different" things. Av will just fire enough flash to exposue the subject, and then time the exposure to properly expose the ambient. This can result in effectively useless exposure times.

I hope this helps. If you could explain a little bit more about how your results "suck" or give an example photo, I would try my best to figure out where the camera/flash/you have a misunderstanding.

The Canon flash system works odd, but if you just let it do it's thing I've found it amazing.

Jasper

[CJMORGAN59]

jadams wrote:
Does the D60 have a FEL (Flash Exposure Lock) button? On my 1D the 550EX is *usually* spot on -- but if I do FEL before, it's *always* spot on.

Use Program Mode and FEL and you shouldn't have a problem.
Jasper


Hi Jasper,
Time is short, sleep has been little, and I have a plate and a half of things to do. But, I'll have to dig out my flash manual book and check out the Flash Exposure Lock operation (it will probably be the first time in a decade that I've actually referred to a photography manual for anything).

Which sort of leads to another problem... where's my flash manual book? No doubt burried under a pile of other things I don't often look at (i.e. bills, dirty underwear, the kids, the family pet, my childhood stamp collection, etc. -- think of the very cluttered den of an absent minded professor and you sort of get the idea).

In any event, I'll read up on the manual about Flash Exposure Lock and hopefully this will get sorted out before I have to photograph a wedding this weekend. I'm a good photographer (the cocky fool says with no false modesty) but I can't do my work well for folks who depend on me if I in turn can't depend on consistency from my equipment (know what I mean, eh?).

So let me check out this FEL thing and then I'll report back (hopefully, and with the presumptions that I don't just get sucked into the abyss of my den's clutter -- a win-win situation either way because perhaps I'll find the kids in there as well).

In any event, thank-you for your help. And likewise thanks to each of you who responded to this thread.

-- Absent Mind "Professor" CJ (off to find his flash manual book and curious as to what else he might find within the clutter)

[Hunter27]

jadams wrote:


In my experience it's an amazing flash -- it does EVERYTHING. Did you ever shoot a photo outside at 1/16,000th of a second - ISO 100 - f/18 and get proper exposure? It's amazing how much the flash handles by itself.



Jasper


Hi Jasper

What were you shooting with these settings?

Nick

http://www.osborneimages.com

[Kelvin]

Originally posted in rec.photo.digital:

I have to concur with your sentiment whole hearted there Don. And besides the obvious (the Canon flash & camera manuals) a really good read can be found here:

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

The really nice thing with using a D60 camera is that you can experiment with all the possible mode combinations and settings until you fully understand how to get consistent and reliable results. Other than that, the only other option is to assume CJ Morgan has a defective camera and/or flash, which is possible but not very likely considering the complexity of the EOS E-TTL flash system.
--
Best Regards,
Kelvin

"Don Cohen" wrote:

The Canon ETTL system can give precise, consistent results, once you fully understand how it works.

[jadams]

Hunter27 wrote:
What were you shooting with these settings?


Hi Nick-

My garden. :D

It wasn't a "ohh --- I need to use these settings" type of thing. I had just got the flash, so I went outside to see how controlled it could keep the exposure in odd situations.

It was doing great no matter what I set the camera to -- so I just kept going.... all the way up to 1/16,000th of a second.

There wasn't a hint of motion blur in those photos!

Jasper

[CJMORGAN59]

cjmorgan59 wrote:
Long and the short of it is this: my results from using the Canon D60 & the Canon 550EX flash just suck (technically speaking) in terms of showing a great lack of consistency. It's like this camera and this flash just are not the most compatiable pair. Which leads to the question: What's the best TTL flash to use with a Canon D60 digtial camera?

Thanks In Advance,
CJ


Quick Update: First, thanks to those who have responded to this thread.

Second, as of yesterday, I tried using the Flash Exposure Lock technique with the Canon D60 camera and the 550EX flash. It seems to work well. But it has it's drawbacks if we need to make flash images quickly and don't always have the time to put out a "test flash". Moreover, when shooting in churches (for weddings and such, for example), the FEL double flash technique might be a bit more of a disturbances than even just a singular flash might be. All of which is to say that the Flash Exposure Locking practice when using the Canon D60 and 550EX is good for something, but not ideal for everything.

Some other folks have turned to using the Metz 36CT or Metz 45MZ for their needs in this regard. The former is not so readily available here in North America (or at least there is little mention of it) and the latter is more readily available (or at least I could find it available at a number of different on-line stores).

But for a better understanding of the limitations of using the 550EX flash with the Canon D60 camera, I refer you to Michael Quacks comments in this thread from the newsgroup rec.photo.digital:

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&threadm=3979d720.0208192218.5a0d8869%40posting.goo gle.com&rnum=2&prev=/groups%3Fas_q%3D%26num%3D10%26as_scoring%3Dr%26hl% 3Den%26ie%3DISO-8859-1%26btnG%3DGoogle%2BSearch%26as_epq%3D%26as_oq%3D% 26as_eq%3D%26as_ugroup%3D%26as_usubject%3D%26as_ua uthors%3Dcjmorgan59%40aol.com%26as_umsgid%3D%26lr% 3D%26as_drrb%3Dq%26as_qdr%3D%26as_mind%3D12%26as_m inm%3D5%26as_miny%3D1981%26as_maxd%3D21%26as_maxm% 3D8%26as_maxy%3D2002%26safe%3Dimages

Meantime, thanks to all those who gave their input here. At the very least I'll be keeping the 550EX flash around for use when using the Flash Exposure Lock technique is applicable, and perhaps I might have to get myself a Metz 54MZ just to cover my other situations (like shooting in the church).

CJ