Focus On Lighting Photos Focus on the Fundamentals.pdf

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the sake of rapid, accurate
movement; today’s cameras
follow similar standards.
Plugging together a makeshift
arrangement of cables
to trigger multiple flash units
can burn the electrical circuits
in the best-built camera! If we
want more than one remote
flash, we have to trigger them
without wires.
Disadvantage 2. A simple
synch cord only triggers
the flash. There can be no
intelligent communication
An inexpensive trigger.
<strong>Focus</strong> <strong>On</strong> <strong>Lighting</strong> <strong>Photos</strong>
between the smart flash and
the smart camera. That’s fine
for now, because we want
you to do as much of the
thinking as possible. Later,
though, you will probably want
to make use of some or all of
your equipment’s intelligence,
and synch cords that can transmit
the extra data tend to be
short and expensive. Because
the whole point of using the
synch cord is to save money,
we may undo its sole advantage
this way.
Light-sensitive trigger
We plug one of these into the
remote flash. It sees the light
from an on-camera flash and
nearly instantly triggers the
flash it’s plugged into. Some
of these actually cost less than
many synch cords, and we can
plug them into literally any
number of flashes without any
risk of damaging our camera
electronics. Many studio strobes
have these already built in, and
we have nothing extra to buy.
This trigger can be
plugged in two ways,
possibly reversing its
positive and negative
electrical terminals.
We tested it at a
distance where it
would barely work at
all. Then we painted a
red dot on the trigger
and the flash to mark
the position
where it works
best.