Flash (3 Viewers)

[grouse]

Does anyone know if the third party manufactured flashguns i.e. Cobra, Vivitar, Sunpak etc. offer the same level of dedication as the manufacturers guns? I have a Minolta Dynax 5 camera and the cheapest Minolta flashgun with a guide no. of 36 is roughly £170.00, a third party gun with a comparable guide no is approximately half that price.
I would appreciate any advice or opinions on this.

 

[walwyn]

What sort of dedication are you looking for?

I'm a bit out of touch with modern systems, but the Olympus dedicated flashguns used to synch with the light metering system, basically the duration of flash was controlled by the amount of light being reflected back off the film plane. Other flash guns synched with the camera but no others were 'dedicated' in that way. Most however had their own sensors which controlled the flash duration, however they were sensing what they saw not what the camera saw.

Let me explain, say you have a flashgun mounted on or next to the camera then the amount of light relected back that the flash sensor and the camera sensor sees is near enough equivalent. However, say you the flashgun positioned some way from the camera or you are using multiple flashguns, then the amount of light that each sensor sees reflected back is going to be different.

However, unless you are going to be doing complex lighting setups I don't think it matters a jot.