I have been experimenting with trying old electronic flashes on my Digital SLRs.
I have read there are some very cheap new speedlights on the market that while not TTL, still have full bounce ,tilt and swivel and can be used on a hotshoe mount.
These are probably a good buy for someone starting out but if you are an old school film shooter like me it is interesting what you might have lying around or can pick up at garage sales or flea markets.
Back some years ago, probably the 1980's ,I bought an achiever 632 LCD Thyristor flash to us with my Pentax Super A(Super Program).
Well this flash does not give me TTL flash(it did originally on my Pentax) but it has enough adjustments on it for me decide how much flash I want whether on manual settings or "P".
Here are some samples I got in my "studio" using the Camera mounted on the hotshoe of a Canon 600d.
I have found that most of these older flashes I have tried so far will work on different camera makes as long as they can be mounted on a hot shoe.
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| Bounce flash, Achiever 632 LCD on Canon 600D |
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| Bounce flash, Achiever 632 LCD on Canon 600D(vertical tilt) |
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| Bounce flash, Achiever 632 LCD on Canon 600D |
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| Flash mounted on Canon 600d |
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| Flash mounted on Canon 600d |
I like finding old camera flashes cheap. Give them to my students or use them myself sometimes. I found a Vivitar 283 last week at a thrift store for $7.95 and it looked new (for a 25 year old flash), took it home, batteried it up and the poor thing could just barely make a little twinkle of a flash. Capacitors were near dead. I will try to always have 4 AA batteries with me in order to try out the next candidate. I use 4 Vivitar 285 flashes on a bracket that allows me to aim them in one direction (at subject for fill or umbrella for a key light) and they work great; flexible, cheap and light weight but I have extra units on hand since these old timers can quit on you in a heartbeat.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comments.I enjoy sourcing out old equipment that is still useful in the digital world. Many are hooking up older camera lenses to dslrs with adaptors. A fun exercise and can be quite rewarding.
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