Hi, I'm Franc Anderson, and I'd like to talk to you about how to buy camera flash. Buying
a camera flash is quite a serious business. You can spend a great deal of money on it.
So the first piece of advice is make sure that you go to a reputable dealer, and make
sure that you look at all the possibilities, especially those made by your own camera manufacturer.
You can spend as little or as much as you like. Features to look for in camera flash
are compatibility, meaning that the camera can talk to the flash gun and vice versa.
It's very useful to have a blinds for something like this, for example, and also you can rotate
it to the wall. This will avoid red eye. In this particular gun's case, this infrared
facility means that the flash gun can assist the camera to focus in low light levels. Other
or extras are a selection of different modes that the gun can work in. The most important
probably is the ability to fill in light during daylight. For example when it's very strong
sunlight, this flash gun can talk to the camera and provide just the right amount of light
to fill in the shadows. Flash synchronization speed is also an issue. With most modern cameras,
this is one two-hundredth of a second or one two-hundred and fiftieth. Beyond that, you
will not get a complete picture, unless of course you pay some more money and you have
an option which is high speed synchronization. Flash zoom is also something that you can
pay for. In this case, when I zoom the lens, a motor inside the flash gun will drive the
lens is inside the flash, and the flash will be synchronized with the zoom on the camera.
Power is also a consideration. This is quite a powerful gun, but for you it might not be
so necessary. You may find yourself using this flash gun only with portraiture. Again,
top end flash guns can provide you with a great deal of versatility. In this particular
case, this gun can be matched with a similar gun and you can have a two flash setup. A
portable mini studio in effect. You can set up a main light which may be over here somewhere,
a second flash gun on the camera, and you will have a main light and a fill light for
a very professional set up. Being able to adjust the exposure is also possible. Here,
these two buttons here, I can underexpose or overexpose the flash. The more facilities
of course the more you have to pay. You might like to consider independent manufacturers
who make equally compatible flash guns but also make more simple guns, this one has got
- still got a lot of facilities but it's a lot cheaper than paying for the matched
mark. It has three automatic ranges, it has its own built-in sensor detecting the exposure,
and interesting in the case of this gun, it has a built-in fill in mini light, which can
be switched on and off to help fill in those shadows in your portraiture. It's really horses
for courses and very often it's done to the amount of money that you really want to spend.