My Yongnuos Failed Me In The Worst Possible Way

BackdoorArts

Senior Member
I've been in Florida for the last 10 days. Part of the trip, and the real reason we went when we did, was to celebrate my in-law's 50th wedding anniversary. Elsewhere on this forum you'll find a post about how a wedding photographer utterly failed at my nephew's wedding and lost a major block of photos due to a memory card failure - including all the family photos. As part of the weekend they wanted to shoot family portraits of all types and my sister in-law asked if I'd shoot them. Not knowing the lighting conditions I shipped down umbrellas and stands and purchased a set of Yongnuo triggers and controller to go with my pair of YN468-II flashes. I tested everything at home to make sure it worked, packed it up and brought them down (the space cost me room for my 105mm macro, which is the one lens I really could have used for all the other photography I found this week - I could have lived without the 150-500mm since it seemed birds didn't want to come out and play).

OK, so I'm in FL, and the morning of the shoot day I test everything again at the house with the help of my brother in-law and we're golden - everything is running fine. I get to my sister in-law's house and we look to find a good spot to shoot. The one I wanted to use in the house has tables and chairs set up for a party, so we find a spot outside we can use that my mother in-law (who had hip replacement surgery 2 months ago) can walk to. Shots are after church, so I get home first and quickly go to set up. As I'm getting things in place I tell my niece to let them know they should get my mother in-law out here so we can start and I can test everything. Next thing you know everybody is coming out because it's "picture time", so now I'm working with an audience of 30.

Flashes are on their triggers, triggers are on the stands, first test shot ... nothing works. Flashes work if I test them, but the triggers aren't receiving anything. Bugger me!! Now I'm debugging with the natives getting restless, and what light I could use naturally fading. I tried everything and finally said "Screw it!!" in a rather unprofessional way, moved everything out of the way and shot with natural light in the shady spot that I picked for that purpose just in case. Thankfully they came out just fine, they just need some WB adjusting and a little help from Color Efex Pro (their Reflector Efex filter does wonders). The D610 is a wonder with higher ISO's and I am thankful that I was able to shoot at a speed in the shade where I didn't have to worry about people moving. But I'll be damned if I can figure out what the heck happened. I spent 10 minutes with it back at the house we were staying at with my brother in-law and a beer before I decided to just put it away and have more beer and figure it out when I get home, which is where I type this. Too much work catch-up going on to worry about it right away, but I'll post what it was when I figure it out. I'm a little pissed I didn't throw the Vello triggers in as a backup (they've never failed me), but I was totally out of room in the backpack with the big lens and DX body for birds.
 

sonicbuffalo_RIP

Senior Member
Hope you enjoyed your time in Florida. Hopefully you can figure out what happened to the triggers...but at least you were thinking ahead and had an area for natural light. Hope your family had a great anniversary!
 

Wolfeye

Senior Member
I've had that happen but had backup gear. Turned out to simply be a dead battery in the transmitter. Do you have a voltmeter? Can you check the transmitter's battery?
 

WayneF

Senior Member
FWIW, I have been stumped before by the RF603 not triggering, until I realized the flash was still in TTL mode. :)
 

BackdoorArts

Senior Member
FWIW, I have been stumped before by the RF603 not triggering, until I realized the flash was still in TTL mode. :)

These are the YN-622N triggers (two receivers and one controller). If I hadn't tested them just before leaving I wouldn't be so mystified.
 

Wolfeye

Senior Member
These are the YN-622N triggers (two receivers and one controller). If I hadn't tested them just before leaving I wouldn't be so mystified.

Battery check. :)

I've opened up a few radio triggers in my day, and it's frankly, amazing they work at all. Cold solder joints, PCB's that look cut out with a machette, globs of glue to hold important pieces together...
 

rocketman122

Senior Member
before setting up my gear to each wedding, energizer NIMH batts are recharged. thye eat power like crazy and understandably so. theyre constantly sending signals and also keep the flashes awake.

but what I do that alleviates any issues I had is to rested each transceiver every event. if you press the gp/mode and channel/AF buttons for 5 seconds (youll see it cycle through the abc/123) things are always rested. I own 6 of these . btw, the N will work with a canon camera though I dont think a flash thats mounted on the 622 shoe will pass proper signal between the lfash and body.

what I wanted to ask is if ou can tell me if you have a nikon flash mounted on the shoe, does it wiggle, even though its locked in place? on the camera the flash sits nice and tight, but on the yn622 they have a lot of play. the shoe has way to much space.
 

BackdoorArts

Senior Member
Battery check. :)

I've opened up a few radio triggers in my day, and it's frankly, amazing they work at all. Cold solder joints, PCB's that look cut out with a machette, globs of glue to hold important pieces together...

Brand new batteries, checked to work. And they worked 3 hours before they didn't. Yongnuo flashes attached as well, as stated, so I can't comment on the stability of Nikon flashes on the hot shoe.
 

sandpiper

New member
what I wanted to ask is if ou can tell me if you have a nikon flash mounted on the shoe, does it wiggle, even though its locked in place? on the camera the flash sits nice and tight, but on the yn622 they have a lot of play. the shoe has way to much space.[/QUOTE]

my sb800 has more play in it on the 622 than it does on the camera (where it is held tight) but nothing i would call excessive... there's also a little bit of play when it is fitted onto the stand that comes with it.

the yongnuo flash screws tight... in fact too tight!
 

PapaST

Senior Member
I'm sorry to hear about the failure Jake. That really stinks but great that you still got the pics. I have 4 of those y22n triggers so I'm curious to know what the issue was. I hope everything is covered.
 

Geoffc

Senior Member
Sorry to hear about that Jake, I can only imagine the stress with all those people. A couple of years ago I decided to learn more about flash lighting and initially bought some triggers which I think were Yongnuo or a copy. They were unpredictable from first use and as I was trying to learn I decided a variable was not much help. I ended up buying pocket wizards and they just work every time. It was not a cheap option but I was fortunate as I can get them at trade price. The other good thing is they are compatible with my Sekonic meter.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD
 

Vixen

Senior Member
Brand new batteries, checked to work. And they worked 3 hours before they didn't. Yongnuo flashes attached as well, as stated, so I can't comment on the stability of Nikon flashes on the hot shoe.

So...have you tried them again since you got home?
Sometimes it is something so simple like having something set wrong. We all think we couldn't possibly make such a simple mistake and feel embarrassed when we find out the equipment failure was really user error :)

New batteries fail too. Depends on how long and how they are stored before you buy them :D
 

BackdoorArts

Senior Member
I've pulled batteries and tested them all and that is not the issue. Otherwise, I've been too darn busy. Might need to wait for the weekend for sorting out.
 

Marcel

Happily retired
Staff member
Super Mod
What a bummer when a thing like that happens. And not knowing what's wrong just adds to the frustration.

I wonder if it could have been interference?
 

BackdoorArts

Senior Member
OK, here's something. I went to use my Vello Freewave remotes this morning to capture the lunar eclipse and they weren't working on my D7100. Not wanting to miss things I put in my wired remote and shot away (pics later). This post reminded me to check it so I plugged into my D610 and they weren't working there either - neither with the remote or with the button on top. For curiosity sake I swapped the connector cable and bam, everything worked.

This is the same cable I used (and previously tested) on my D610 with the flash triggers. After some play it seems that it's not a tight fit and with some jiggling at the jack end it works fine. When I tested it I was shooting handheld and it's possible that my hand position caused the cable to be pressed in place more firmly on the side of the camera, but once on the tripod there was nothing to do that. Just a theory that will need to be tested later. The suspect cable came with the Yongnuo trigger where the cables that work are Vellos.

More to come.
 

§am

Senior Member
I've not had any issues with my Yongnuo receivers (YN-622N) but I've not used them in lots of anger yet.
However, the transmitter/controller (YN-622N-TX) has been a little problematic in that when using the receiver to control the shutter viathe transmitter, it would not fire when on my body (it would focus though).
Taking it off the body and it wold just release the shutter but not focus first!

I'm yet to reset to factory settings all my equipment (flash triggers anyway, not camera body), but that might be a thing to check too.

I assume you're using YN-622N's only though??
 

BackdoorArts

Senior Member
I've not had any issues with my Yongnuo receivers (YN-622N) but I've not used them in lots of anger yet.
However, the transmitter/controller (YN-622N-TX) has been a little problematic in that when using the receiver to control the shutter viathe transmitter, it would not fire when on my body (it would focus though).
Taking it off the body and it wold just release the shutter but not focus first!

I'm yet to reset to factory settings all my equipment (flash triggers anyway, not camera body), but that might be a thing to check too.

I assume you're using YN-622N's only though??

Yes, only the YN-622N's. And as I said, it worked flawlessly 3 hours before packing it up to take to the party. I suspect the cable more and more as I think about it, but need the time to debug it.
 

Englischdude

Senior Member
all credit to you Jake. shooting great shots in ideal conditions with perfectly working equipment and cooperative subjects is a challenge in itself, it is a real credit to you that you managed to pull the shoot off under these frustrating conditions. If I wore a hat id take it off to you sir, as I dont, I'll give you an enthusiastic 2 thumbs-up instead!
 

BackdoorArts

Senior Member
Just to put a period on this adventure, I had an opportunity this afternoon to hook everything up and, wouldn't you know it, things worked (the batteries in one flash were dead, but the other worked fine, where I had nothing in FL). I used the Vello cable in my bag this time and have sent an email to Yongnuo to see what I need to do to get the cable replaced (too much of a PITA to got thru Amazon since they'll likely want me to pack up the whole thing and return it).
 
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