To ETTL or not to ETTL, that is the question...

DHPHOTO66 wrote in post #13897028
This was a responce to Wilt"s post with the pics, his setup was with a tripod as well....

I understand, but since this flowed directly from my comments about consistency I felt I needed to respond. ETTL does some things well, and others not so well. I spent a lot of money chasing ETTL capable gear and decided in the long run its not suited to many of the ways I shoot. Since the original title of the thread is To ettl or not, it seems reasonable to point out the ways its less effective.

Agreed Gonzo...I started by saying "Its better to have and not NEED, than NEED and not have"...TTL is not good for every situation niether is MANUAL...but why buy a system that does only manual get a ystem that can do both and just switch if you need to

DHPHOTO66 wrote in post #13897131
Agreed Gonzo...I started by saying "Its better to have and not NEED, than NEED and not have"...TTL is not good for every situation niether is MANUAL...but why buy a system that does only manual get a ystem that can do both and just switch if you need to

Money. You can get non ettl triggers dirt cheap. Same with non ettl flashes. I learned the hard way.

DHPHOTO66 wrote in post #13897004
Thanks Wilt, but is that really visible to the naked eye, would it be hard to adjust in post if I needed? Like anything else, what are the standard variances we accept? Once again thanks for posting that tech info. I can see you and I will be have some wonderful discussions in the future, u seem to be a good guy....
I looks like your system has a disconect, maybe its the hotshoe, I had another 20D body that did that full maual thing every few shots, the hotshoe connect was broken bearly moved, but when it did it was blow out city...lol

Leaving out the results in manual flash, ETTL flash provided two different results although the frame content was unaltered...the flash head forward resulting in photos around RGB 137, while the ETTL bounce was in two groups, one at 114 and another at 120. One would think that ETTL would have gotten the density in the same range for all 12 shots. I know (from past metering) that the manual flash output is repeatable to within 0.1EV, so why isn't ETTL able to keep the density of the shots to within that same limit? Shooting with the same flash in Auto (photosensor) mode, I can get exposures under direct flash and exposures under bounce flash to both be within 0.1EV of each other. Instead, under ETTL I have found 0.6EV of variability in frame density under ETTL control
(although I will admit that my prior posted example was better than that -- if we ignore the ETTL failure caused by poor hotshoe contact issues)

Wilt wrote in post #13897178
I can get exposures under direct flash and exposures under bounce flash to both be within 0.1EV of each other. Instead, under ETTL I have found 0.6EV of variability in frame density under ETTL control
(although I will admit that my prior posted example was better than that -- if we ignore the ETTL failure caused by poor hotshoe contact issues)

Maybe lighting is rapidly changing before our eye, too fast for us to see...LOL. Just kidding, that is something the GEEKS at Canon will have to work on. It was nice discussing with you...

gonzogolf wrote in post #13897170
Money. You can get non ettl triggers dirt cheap. Same with non ettl flashes. I learned the hard way.

Why limit yourself?..Didnt someone here said they have a full Manual setup (Stratos II)and now they are in a situation where they need TTL and have to buy a totally new system(looking at the Pixel Kings)? Does that sounds logical, my SUV has 4WD, I live in NEPA and it doesnt snow everyday but when it does I like to know that 4WD is only a switch away....

DHPHOTO66 wrote in post #13897295
Why limit yourself?..Didnt someone here said they have a full Manual setup (Stratos II)and now they are in a situation where they need TTL and have to buy a totally new system(looking at the Pixel Kings)? Does that sounds logical, my SUV has 4WD, I live in NEPA and it doesnt snow everyday but when it does I like to know that 4WD is only a switch away....

Why over buy capacity, when you dont need it? Especially when it can be 4 times the cost. The reason I keep reinforcing this is the number of users who fear manual flash, feel they have to retain ETTL only to find that its not particularly well suited to the thing they bought it for.

DHPHOTO66 wrote in post #13897272
Maybe lighting is rapidly changing before our eye, too fast for us to see...LOL. Just kidding, that is something the GEEKS at Canon will have to work on. It was nice discussing with you...

I have a theory that the same flash engineer who designed Canon ETTL went to work at Nikon as well, and made their flash automation equally inept!

If you have EX2 flashes and pixel kings and the right Canon DSLR, you can adjust the manual power settings of the flash without having to do it from the back of the flash, just do it via camera menu. Just a point of convenience.

Pixel Kings are around $100 for a pair, Strato is $80ish?

Wilt wrote in post #13897546
I have a theory that the same flash engineer who designed Canon ETTL went to work at Nikon as well, and made their flash automation equally inept!

LOL....just sticking with Canon because this is a Canon based forum...LOL

gonzogolf wrote in post #13897315
Why over buy capacity, when you dont need it? Especially when it can be 4 times the cost. The reason I keep reinforcing this is the number of users who fear manual flash, feel they have to retain ETTL only to find that its not particularly well suited to the thing they bought it for.

Speaking of over buy, why buy 580 and 430s....just get 540s, vivitars and third party flashes

DHPHOTO66 wrote in post #13897657
Speaking of over buy, why buy 580 and 430s....just get 540s, vivitars and third party flashes

My point exactly. If you dont need ETTL for OCF, dont buy it. I firmly believe that most photographers need one ETTL capable flash for when they are doing mobile work where the scene changes from shot to shot. Weddings, event work, night club shooting etc. But the need for ETTL off camera is often less, HSS can be useful, and some folks use multi-strobes in a wedding reception application, but for portrait work its way overrated.