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Affordable external flash for the FZ50

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gkreth

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I'm trying to help my brother find a flash for his FZ50.

His main requirement is more power/reach, i.e., GN of 120 or greater.

So far, I've been able to find the following:
1. Vivitar 285
2. Sunpak 383
3. Sunpak 433D (essentially an older version of the 383)

Any other suggestions?

TTL is not required, and would push the price up quite a bit.

My main concern about getting a used TTL flash is getting a "wrong" one, i.e., one configured for a Nikon, Canon, Pentax, etc. (I've read that the FZ50 is TTL-configured like an Olympus). If one has, say a TTL-for-Nikon flash, would mess up/fry out an FZ50? Or could one use it as a simple non-TTL flash?

Thanks in advance,

--Greg
 
You might want to consider the Vivitar 283 rather than the 285. There are more of them around and the 283 was a system with loads of accessories, many of which are still available.

Things like bounce flash adapters, filters, plug-in modules to manually control the light, extension cables that move the flash contacts AND the auto sensor to the camera's hot shoe and so on.

Also, it is very easy to build external power packs and run the flash all day from a 6V gell cell. Email me if you want info on that.

The only thing to watch is country of manufacture. Try to get one made in China or Korea as these have the low trigger voltage as apposed to the made in Japan which have the high voltage. Look on the bottom near the foot.

I have several, and a few months ago, I bought a new in box made in Korea 283 for $50 canadian.

Allan
 
Allan Brown said:
You might want to consider the Vivitar 283 rather than the 285.
There are more of them around and the 283 was a system with loads
of accessories, many of which are still available.

Things like bounce flash adapters, filters, plug-in modules to
manually control the light, extension cables that move the flash
contacts AND the auto sensor to the camera's hot shoe and so on.

Also, it is very easy to build external power packs and run the
flash all day from a 6V gell cell. Email me if you want info on
that.

The only thing to watch is country of manufacture. Try to get one
made in China or Korea as these have the low trigger voltage as
apposed to the made in Japan which have the high voltage. Look on
the bottom near the foot.

I have several, and a few months ago, I bought a new in box made in
Korea 283 for $50 canadian.

Allan
Click to expand...
Hey, Allen! I have a 283 as well as a 285. Two things I like about the 285 is that it already has the manual control of the light and the three-way wide/med/zoom head built in. I know I could get these for my 283 as well, but it would cost more.

I use my 283 primarily as an off-camera slave unit, because it's one of the older high-voltage units. I tested it, and it output 288 volts:



I use it with a slave sensor only.

I've looked into the Wein safe-synch votalge controllers, but they cost more than what a used flash would cost me.

The big, BIG issue for me is the TTL hot-shoe on the FZ50. For every other camera I have owned, the flash hot-shoe was non-TTL. i.e., they had ONLY the one center contact. So when I use my 433D (which is TTL for Minolta, I think, but I could be wrong about that), the extra contact doesn't touch anything, sends no data, recieves no data - it just sits there blind and mute, so to speak.

But the FZ50 has a TTL hot-shoe. And so I'm still confused as to owhat would happen if one were to mount a TTL flash on the FZ50, i.e., a flash that is TTL but NOT for the Olympus/FZ50. would the flash contacts touch the FZ50 contacts and send/receive erroeous data?

I've read where some people put a strip of film in the hot shoe, with just a hole cut out in the center for the main contact. But I'm sure my brother would not wanna go thru that hassle (this is for his FZ50 setup, I acutally have an FZ20 and an FZ30).

At this point is seems safest to steer him toward a non-TTL flash. But there are not too many of those out there with a GN of 120 or greater. The two Vivitars and the Sunpak 383 are all I can find so far...

Still looking for info: If anyone can shed some light on this whole TTL specification, I'd be very grateful.

--Greg
 
doan said:
Yes, any auto, non TTL flash will work. Just make sure the trigger
voltage is below panasonic specs.. (5v i think). Any resonably new
flash should be OK.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the replay, David. Unfortunately, I wasn';t quite clear about what I was looking for.

I realize that a non-TTL flash will work fine. What I DON'T know is if I can use a TTL flash that was NOT designed to work with the FZ50 (i.e., the Olympus) TTL specification.

Still looking for answers....

--Greg
 
Don't know whether this helps I have a multi-dedicated Cobra MD210 and it does not operate as a TTL flash on any manufacturer setting inclusive of Olympus, although it works really well as an auto flash!
 
Have a look at the Nissin 360 tw. It has a guide no of 36/120 it is a twin flash,with bounce and swivel.(no zoom) It has a trigger voltage of 10.5 so very safe on the pany which can take a maximum of 24 volts. They go on ebay quite regularly for pennies. I have 3 of them and they work great with my FZ30. A good one comes with 4/5 coloured filters and a slave unit.
 
The Olympus 36 & 50 both work with the FZ50, They will use the TTL feature. I don't know if the F36 (about $175 US) will break your budget.
--
Peter

Photography has a lot in common with pipe smoking.

There is far more fiddling around with the equipment than there ever is in using it!
 
gkreth said:
doan said:
Yes, any auto, non TTL flash will work. Just make sure the trigger
voltage is below panasonic specs.. (5v i think). Any resonably new
flash should be OK.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the replay, David. Unfortunately, I wasn';t quite clear
about what I was looking for.

I realize that a non-TTL flash will work fine. What I DON'T know
is if I can use a TTL flash that was NOT designed to work with the
FZ50 (i.e., the Olympus) TTL specification.
Click to expand...
Having the "wrong" TTL spec means that your camera and flash unit do not exactly speak the same "language," and cannot communicate closely, as is hoped for when TTL compatibility is achieved. The lack of TTL compatibility will not result in a voltage overload situation. This only occurs when the flash (usully an older model) has a trigger voltage higher than 24volts (in the case of FZ30 and FZ50), which could endanger the circuitry surrounding the camera hot shoe.
Check your flash trigger voltage here:
http://www.botzilla.com/photo/strobeVolts.html

--

 
percush said:
Have a look at the Nissin 360 tw. It has a guide no of 36/120 it is
a twin flash,with bounce and swivel.(no zoom) It has a trigger
voltage of 10.5 so very safe on the pany which can take a maximum
of 24 volts. They go on ebay quite regularly for pennies. I have 3
of them and they work great with my FZ30. A good one comes with 4/5
coloured filters and a slave unit.
Click to expand...
Well, I managed to snag a Nissin 360 TW on eBay for $14.70 + $4.40 s/h.

I should get it in a few days.

Maybe it'll give me a faster FPS continuous burst than what I've been getting with my Sunpak....

Thanks!

--Greg
 
Dear Ben,

I just bought a Cullmann 34AF-O for my FZ-50, but it doesn't seem to work. I've set the external flash option for both preset or manual, and I set "Force External Flash" to ON. All that happens is that the built-in flash stops working. Also, tried in P, A, and M modes.

Is there some other config to make or is it probably just a defective unit I got? I would like to hear from you because you have successfully used this unit with the FZ-50 before I send the flash back.

Thanks in advance.

Dilney
Ben Herrmann said:
Cullmann has a nice sign of flash units and these happen to be
dedicated to the Olympus TTL mount - so it will work on the FZ-50
superbly. Here's the link:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=2609&A=details&Q=&sku=367183&is=USA&addedTroughType=categoryNavigation

or

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=2609&A=details&Q=&sku=367179&is=USA&addedTroughType=categoryNavigation

I've tried both and they work superbly.

Have a great day!



Click to expand...
 
Hard to kill these old Vivitars... had this one for 18 years and still going strong! This is a Japan made one and works quite nicely with my FZ50... Though I would like the Oly FL-36, for the convenience of TTL... hehe getting lazy in my old age.

 
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