SB-700 / SB-800 on D5300
- Thread starter ejronin
- Start date
Horoscope Fish
Senior Member
I too appreciate I could purchase three or four Yongnuo flashes for the same price as my Nikon SB-700 and that they work just as well if not better than the Nikons. The real reason I reach for them before I do my Nikon speedlights, though, is because the Yongnuos are just a pleasure to work with in small ways, but ways that still matter. For example I find the Yongnuo interface easier to read and easier to work with. When I need to stop everything so I can tweak a setting in the middle of a portrait session, I appreciate the bigger, brighter display on the Yongnuo. The SB-700 has a decent display, but the Yongnuo's display is BETTER. The buttons on the Yongnuo are bigger and more spaced out making them easier to work with. My SB-700 requires me to press a release on the side of the head to adjust the tilt and swivel; the Yongnuo I just grab and abuse. On paper these small details probably don't sound like they're worth mentioning, but when there's two flashes I can choose from it's these small details that sway my decision. Once I got used to these minor design differences, using the Nikon units became even more annoying and the whole thing turned into a self-perpetuating death spiral for the Nikon flashes in general. Then I realized those Nikon flashes now gathering dust in my bag would fetch a decent price on eBay. Selling off even one Nikon speedlight could pay for two more brand-new Yongnuo flashes and triggers...
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Price and ease of use. Simple unit - it flashes with few extra bells and whistles.
Wow, when I bought my SB-910 new from B&H, it was over $500. :eyetwitch:
Glad you were able to make your decision. Personally I own the SB-910 and the SB-700. Both have excellent performance although I've read many great things about the Yongnuo flashes. Good luck and enjoy your new toy. :encouragement:
You are of course correct, it was near $550. I misspoke, Sorry.
RocketCowboy
Senior Member
The Yongnuos go on location with me, for events where drunk people are very likely to trip over light stands despite my best planning. The SB-910s stay in the home studio, where people are less ... intoxicated.
Another factor to consider is heat management. I shot an event using two on-shoe flash on Christmas, a theatrical performance for kids with disabilities in a historic museum/school attached to a large ornate palace. I had a 70-200 on the D7000 and Yongnuo 568ex II and a D800 with SB-900 with 24-70 2.8.
In one scene 20 kids are invited to participate so wanted to get at least one shot feature an individual child plus the adult characters interacting. I used the 200mm, field of view for 300mm on the DX D7000 for reaction shots of audience members. About 200 shots into it performance the SB900 quite, noticed only after wasting a few shows without the flash going off. Glaced at the display and it had the over temp warning. I pulled it off and switched to the 568 and continued for the rest of the performance. I have only had that happen once before because I was shooting in low light in a large venue so every flash was a full dump. Usually, by choice of iso and shutter speed, I can reduce the power requirements.
SB900s gave problems to wedding shooters because churches often have very high ceilings and need a lot of power for a bounce. I like the SB900 but I usually do not need full power so they do all I need, plus have a narrower zoom beam width on the rare cases where I need to project a lot of light on a distant subject. Later model Yongnuo flash have 200mm field of view also.
Beginning with flash opens up all sorts of opportunities to have more control of your final results, and less constrained by ambient light that seldom cooperates. The first thing to get used to is manual exposure. Auto exposure modes are not recommended with flash and one reason is simply that it is easier and the second key reason is that it puts you back in control of how the results will turn out. The meter works in manual mode so you know what the exposure is in current condition if the flash does not fire. You do not want to adjust the exposure Triad (time, sensitivity and light gathering) of shutter, ISO and aperture. If you know the flash is going to add light, you do not want to center the light meter or else it will overexpose. So visualize what you want as a result. If you want great depth of field so subjects in the background and your target subject are both in focus you know you are needing to stop down to a smaller aperture(larger f/ number), if you know you want motion frozen you have the choice of freezing motion with fast shutter speed which exposes the background much darker, or use a slow shutter speed for a brighter background and let the flash due to its very fast pulse speed stop the action. Basically, you are selecting each exposure setting to for the desired image result, instead of overall exposure which is taken care of automatically by the flash. Without flash you are used to optimizing exposure but with flash in TTL mode, you are optimizing the image and then let the flash make up the difference needed for proper exposure. That means you need a bit of difference between the static meter reading and the final contribution to the light. It sounds more complicated but really is simpler than non-flash. Your only exposure decision is the relative brightness of background to subject. If you want the background to be dark, such as in a portrait in a non-ideal location with a messy background just dial in more underexposure on the meter so the background fades into black. On the other hand, if you are in a typical decently lit scene and the subject in front, dial in 1-2 stops underexposure. The subject will be properly exposed by the flash filling in the subject.
If taking flash shots of people have them move out from the wall to reduce a hard shadow on the back wall. Just having the flash head vertically above the axis of the lens causes shadows to fall behind the subject so the shadow in blocked from view from the point of view of the sensor. Having it higher and further from the axis of the sensor also lower the chances of "Red Eye", when a strong light on or near the axis of the lens, reflections from the retina of the eye, turning the center of the eye bright red.
With the TTL BL mode, fill light can make shooting people in midday sun much more attractive. I use flash almost every time I pick up the camera, indoors or out, nighttime or daytime.
In one scene 20 kids are invited to participate so wanted to get at least one shot feature an individual child plus the adult characters interacting. I used the 200mm, field of view for 300mm on the DX D7000 for reaction shots of audience members. About 200 shots into it performance the SB900 quite, noticed only after wasting a few shows without the flash going off. Glaced at the display and it had the over temp warning. I pulled it off and switched to the 568 and continued for the rest of the performance. I have only had that happen once before because I was shooting in low light in a large venue so every flash was a full dump. Usually, by choice of iso and shutter speed, I can reduce the power requirements.
SB900s gave problems to wedding shooters because churches often have very high ceilings and need a lot of power for a bounce. I like the SB900 but I usually do not need full power so they do all I need, plus have a narrower zoom beam width on the rare cases where I need to project a lot of light on a distant subject. Later model Yongnuo flash have 200mm field of view also.
Beginning with flash opens up all sorts of opportunities to have more control of your final results, and less constrained by ambient light that seldom cooperates. The first thing to get used to is manual exposure. Auto exposure modes are not recommended with flash and one reason is simply that it is easier and the second key reason is that it puts you back in control of how the results will turn out. The meter works in manual mode so you know what the exposure is in current condition if the flash does not fire. You do not want to adjust the exposure Triad (time, sensitivity and light gathering) of shutter, ISO and aperture. If you know the flash is going to add light, you do not want to center the light meter or else it will overexpose. So visualize what you want as a result. If you want great depth of field so subjects in the background and your target subject are both in focus you know you are needing to stop down to a smaller aperture(larger f/ number), if you know you want motion frozen you have the choice of freezing motion with fast shutter speed which exposes the background much darker, or use a slow shutter speed for a brighter background and let the flash due to its very fast pulse speed stop the action. Basically, you are selecting each exposure setting to for the desired image result, instead of overall exposure which is taken care of automatically by the flash. Without flash you are used to optimizing exposure but with flash in TTL mode, you are optimizing the image and then let the flash make up the difference needed for proper exposure. That means you need a bit of difference between the static meter reading and the final contribution to the light. It sounds more complicated but really is simpler than non-flash. Your only exposure decision is the relative brightness of background to subject. If you want the background to be dark, such as in a portrait in a non-ideal location with a messy background just dial in more underexposure on the meter so the background fades into black. On the other hand, if you are in a typical decently lit scene and the subject in front, dial in 1-2 stops underexposure. The subject will be properly exposed by the flash filling in the subject.
If taking flash shots of people have them move out from the wall to reduce a hard shadow on the back wall. Just having the flash head vertically above the axis of the lens causes shadows to fall behind the subject so the shadow in blocked from view from the point of view of the sensor. Having it higher and further from the axis of the sensor also lower the chances of "Red Eye", when a strong light on or near the axis of the lens, reflections from the retina of the eye, turning the center of the eye bright red.
With the TTL BL mode, fill light can make shooting people in midday sun much more attractive. I use flash almost every time I pick up the camera, indoors or out, nighttime or daytime.
Somebody really ought to mention that good portraits are Not about which flash unit we use. You do want flash, as continuous lights are a pain, but portraits are about the lighting.
The speedlight flashes ought to be placed in white reflected umbrellas, and positioned "as close as possible" to the subject for soft lighting.
And the two flashes are Not just either side of camera. The Main and Fill light concept is that the Main light is positioned about 45 degrees wide and high, with respect to the subject face. 45 degrees wide means as the subject sees it... the camera is at 0 degrees, the Main light is about 45 degrees to the side. Height could be 30 degrees or up to 45 degrees higher than the subjects face. Close as possible is maybe 30-36 inches for a softbox, or maybe 4 or 5 feet is necessary for a reflected umbrellas fabric. The subject can probably reach out and touch the umbrella stand, just out of sight of the camera. The idea of "close" is that the light should be approximately at a distance roughly equal to the lights size, 3 foot light at 3 feet, 4 foot light at 4 feet, etc. That guarantees adequate soft lighting.
The Fill light is very frontal, meaning, as close to the lens axis as possible, to "see" and light exactly what the lens sees. In order for the camera to see around it, it has to be back by the camera (and for proper portrait perspective, the camera should be back 6 to 10 feet from the subject. 6 feet would work, 8 is great, and I like 10 feet). So the fill light fabric is necessarily back there too. I like to have its pole right beside the lens (within an inch), with the fabric height slightly above the camera. Use a lens hood, and make sure no fill light spill is entering the lens.
This concept of main light high and wide intentionally creates the shadows on the face that create the modeling, to show the shapes of facial curves and shaped. There are variations of this exact position (with names like Rembrandt, etc), but the main idea is around 45 degrees high and wide. However, even with the umbrella, those shadows will be darker and harsher than desired. So, we use the Fill light power level to meter about 1 stop less than the main light (metered at the subject).
An incident flash meter is a wonderful thing for studio portraits, but there are other approximations. If two identical flashes and umbrellas, then Main at 4 feet and fill at 5.6 feet (these are fstop numbers) will be fill 1 EV less. Or Fill at Half the power of Main at 8 feet will be 1 EV less. Or 1/4 the power of Main at 11 feet, etc. But a good flash meter is a very valuable accessory if you will doing much of this. It makes setup be very easy, and very repeatable.
This Fill one stop less than main is approximate, but this is the lighting ratio, which is rather important. One stop difference is the standard 1:3 ratio. It could be 1.5 stops less, etc.
Anyway, the Fill light fills those harsh Main shadows, and the result is the very pleasing and very intentional slight gradient tonal shadows on the face, to show its shape well. This makes all the difference, this is "lighting". The Fill is very frontal so that it will not create a second set of shadows on the face (any frontal shadows are hidden directly behind the subject). The reduced fill on the face is flat light, but the Main light is anything but flat.
See 45 degree Portrait Lighting Setup for a bit more about this concept.
When people speak of the "flash look", I suspect they mean the Deer In The Headlights look, very flat lighting. There is none of that with good Main and Fill light. It is wonderful soft and natural light which does Not look like "flash".
One more idea is use an inexpensive white balance card in the first setup test shot (Porta Brace at B&H for $5 is my choice, but even a white envelope can work). This makes white balance correction be trivial.
The speedlight flashes ought to be placed in white reflected umbrellas, and positioned "as close as possible" to the subject for soft lighting.
And the two flashes are Not just either side of camera. The Main and Fill light concept is that the Main light is positioned about 45 degrees wide and high, with respect to the subject face. 45 degrees wide means as the subject sees it... the camera is at 0 degrees, the Main light is about 45 degrees to the side. Height could be 30 degrees or up to 45 degrees higher than the subjects face. Close as possible is maybe 30-36 inches for a softbox, or maybe 4 or 5 feet is necessary for a reflected umbrellas fabric. The subject can probably reach out and touch the umbrella stand, just out of sight of the camera. The idea of "close" is that the light should be approximately at a distance roughly equal to the lights size, 3 foot light at 3 feet, 4 foot light at 4 feet, etc. That guarantees adequate soft lighting.
The Fill light is very frontal, meaning, as close to the lens axis as possible, to "see" and light exactly what the lens sees. In order for the camera to see around it, it has to be back by the camera (and for proper portrait perspective, the camera should be back 6 to 10 feet from the subject. 6 feet would work, 8 is great, and I like 10 feet). So the fill light fabric is necessarily back there too. I like to have its pole right beside the lens (within an inch), with the fabric height slightly above the camera. Use a lens hood, and make sure no fill light spill is entering the lens.
This concept of main light high and wide intentionally creates the shadows on the face that create the modeling, to show the shapes of facial curves and shaped. There are variations of this exact position (with names like Rembrandt, etc), but the main idea is around 45 degrees high and wide. However, even with the umbrella, those shadows will be darker and harsher than desired. So, we use the Fill light power level to meter about 1 stop less than the main light (metered at the subject).
An incident flash meter is a wonderful thing for studio portraits, but there are other approximations. If two identical flashes and umbrellas, then Main at 4 feet and fill at 5.6 feet (these are fstop numbers) will be fill 1 EV less. Or Fill at Half the power of Main at 8 feet will be 1 EV less. Or 1/4 the power of Main at 11 feet, etc. But a good flash meter is a very valuable accessory if you will doing much of this. It makes setup be very easy, and very repeatable.
This Fill one stop less than main is approximate, but this is the lighting ratio, which is rather important. One stop difference is the standard 1:3 ratio. It could be 1.5 stops less, etc.
Anyway, the Fill light fills those harsh Main shadows, and the result is the very pleasing and very intentional slight gradient tonal shadows on the face, to show its shape well. This makes all the difference, this is "lighting". The Fill is very frontal so that it will not create a second set of shadows on the face (any frontal shadows are hidden directly behind the subject). The reduced fill on the face is flat light, but the Main light is anything but flat.
See 45 degree Portrait Lighting Setup for a bit more about this concept.
When people speak of the "flash look", I suspect they mean the Deer In The Headlights look, very flat lighting. There is none of that with good Main and Fill light. It is wonderful soft and natural light which does Not look like "flash".
One more idea is use an inexpensive white balance card in the first setup test shot (Porta Brace at B&H for $5 is my choice, but even a white envelope can work). This makes white balance correction be trivial.