Anyone had any experiance with Olympus "Super Flash"

[ajohnw]

I recently bought a Metz flash gun for 2 of my Olympus cameras and found that I couldn't get the stated flash sync speed on the E-M5. Just refused to go over 1/160. The small one that comes with the camera can go to 1/250 as Olympus state for the camera. Just shows that some web searching is a good idea when buying anything. Fortunately I can send it back even though the seller may not be too keen on the idea. Not sure yet but may need a dispute. It seems this is a common problem with flash guns on Olympus cameras even some of their own. Metz is a pretty reputable company so I had asked about full compatibility before buying. I already have another gun with the same problem.

Looking at the manual for the FL-36 and R version is seems one mode can allow flash use up to the maximum camera shutter speed. Power drops off at higher speeds so I'd guess they fire some sort of burst in sync with the shutter. I wondered if anyone had any experience of using this? Certainly an interesting idea and as far as I know unique.

John
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[inkista]

I've used FP-TTL/FP-MANUAL (eyeroll) modes (aka HSS) with an FL-50 and my G3. It does indeed work as advertised, allowing for flash sync up to the maximum shutter speed of the body. It's basically just doing the timed pulsing thing to act as a continuous light source that speedlights do when they're performing high-speed sync.

[rant on]

I really just DO NOT GET why Panasonic (who I read somewhere make both the Oly and Panasonic version of the flash?!) or whoever has decided that HSS should have two modes all its own, rather than making it an on/off setting regardless of whether the flash is in TTL/Manual/Auto or whatever, like every other speedlight out there but no. Four-thirds HSS needs its own damn modes. [spit].

But then what do you expect of a flash that displays its power setting by GUIDE NUMBER instead of ratio? (and unlike the FL-36R and FL-600R/FL-360L, there's no custom menu to switch it to power ratios). I can't wait to dump this POS and get an underpowered, slow-recycling, but tiny and remote controllable FL-600R/FL-360L. Or maybe not. (sigh). But the frickin' FL-580L is $600. For that price, I could get me a 600EX-RT and a YN ST-E3-RT.

The one place where mirrorless is carloads behind dSLRs is flash options.

Ok, maybe not THAT bad, but I do seem to hit a lot more frustration and roadblocks in this area given my Canon-bred expectations of what should be out there.

[rant off].

[ajohnw]

I no idea other cameras had this facility Kathy. Makes sense since they started dumping excess power back into the capacitor that powers the flash. That was a long long time ago.

I looked at the 600 but it has a toy town manual even mixed language all in one. I went for a used 36R with 6 months guarantee for 125 notes as I am not keen on the prices either. Camera exchange also has a 50R for 200 uk notes. The earlier guns come with a proper manual.

John
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[ajohnw]

Well it arrived.

Gave it one severe test for my sort of use - dark corner of the room metered for the scene though the window which seemed to need over -3 EV to expose correctly. The illumination of the room was perfect from about 3m +. It wasn't so good on the Metz. Then the camera battery indicator started flashing. Pretty sure that max flash sync speed in normal mode is 1/200 with this gun. I haven't tried the high shutter speed mode yet. I'm wondering if the sync speed has to be like this because of the burst mode for higher shutter speeds

The 2 way head swivel is locked via 2 buttons which seems a bit OTT to me. The auto zoom in the head does sync with the lens that I had on (12-50mm) and the diffuser for down to 8mm on m 4/3 slides in and out of the head so I wont be loosing it. Looks like the zoom can be adjusted manually as well for bounce when the light path is longer.

The guide numbers with the camera shutter at 1/8000 range from 1.1 at 8mm to 3.2 at 42mm (ISO 100) and I'll bet the 50R doesn't cost a penny more to make.

John
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