Lighting advice/recommendations?

[Sean Setters]

...I think only Nixon strobes can do this as well. No other third party strobe has this capablity to sync higher than 1/250th. (1/200th on 5D)
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Actually, when talking about on-camera flash use the Canon and Nikon flashes can do a high-speed sync. However, off-camera, it's not the flash really that allows for higher shutter speeds--it's the camera. Some Nikon cameras have an electronic shutter instead of the mechanical shutter of the Canon system. This allows the entire sensor to be exposed during a short amount of time avoiding the frame-blocking of the mechanical leaves.


The new Pocketwizards, however, can enable a slightly faster shutter speed than your max rated sync speed. They do this by regulating the timing of the firiing of the strobe relative to your camera's triggering signal. You can even program the timing for optimal effect. It's not a huge gain, but I think you can get up to 1/400 sec on the 5dMkII without shutter blockage from what I've read.

[Mark Elberson]

Sean, do you know if Canon's Wireless E-TTL allows for High-Speed Sync?


This is how Canon explains High-Speed Sync. I thought this was pretty cool.


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[Chuck Lee]

Sean, not sure how that works on the 5D MKII because of the mechanical limitation of the shutter curtain. Marks illustration of high speed sync shows the problem. The 1st and 2nd curtain above 1/200th on my 5D M I or 1/250th on my 40D move together at some point during the frame. The full frame is never exposed at any one moment in time above these sync speeds. The only way to fully expose the whole frame is to be able to hold the flash burst on as the two shutters move across the frame. Otherwise, pick 1st or 2nd curtain sync, shoot at 1/400 and crop. Or have a flash head that can emmit light at a given luinosity for better than 1/250th of a second.


Electronic shutter..... no problem.


Mark....cool chart.


Dang, Dave Hobby did a great Blog post on all this topic but right now I'm unable to locate a link for it. He even had photos he'd taken during a sunny day where the curtain shadow was part of the scene and it worked!! I'll look later tonight and see ifI can find it.


Jarhead, here's a good one on triggers: http://strobist.blogspot.com/2006/03/lighting-101-pc-cords-and-pocket.html

[Sean Setters]

I was incorrect about the 5DMII with the new Pocketwizards at 1/400 sec. With Hypersync and 1/320 sec, a distinct shutter can be seen at the bottom of the frame, but it's not a whole lot. It's still better at 1/400 sec than trying to use a wired trigger.


Check out these results by Rob Galbraith. He tests curtain visibility at different shutter speeds with a Dyna-Lite Arena pack.


It's long, but check out an earlier page on the same site for a full explanation of how Hypersync works. Just scroll down to the Hypersync heading.

[Chuck Lee]

Cool Article,


As you can tell I don't shoot over 1/160th in the studio with my 5d, cactus and AB800's. The Vivitars sync up fine at 1/200 with the cactus triggers.


BTW this is the best I could do from strobist: http://strobist.blogspot.com/2008/01/control-your-world-with-ultra-high-sync.html


I know there's more there. I feel like such a search weeny!


Chuck

[Chuck Lee]

Here's one example: What a cheat!! Absolutely cool!!


<span style="color: #810081;"]http://strobist.blogspot.com/search?q=sync+speed


I'm not a search weeny after all.

[Chuck Lee]

Woops....here's the link:


http://strobist.blogspot.com/2008/10/great-video-on-overclocking-your-sync.html