EOS 300D Shutter Speed Restricition.

2 Days ago I bought an EOS 300D for £50 from eBay with 18-55mm lens! (bargain), but I've noticed that when I use the internal flash I'm restricted to 1/200sec shutter speed rather than the full 1/4000thsec which I can do without the flash, I presume this is due to the flash being incapable of working fast enough (correct me if I am wrong). Does that mean if I get an external high-speed flash/speedlight (meaning one capable of such speed) will I be able to use the high shutter speed with a flash?

According to the manual you do have high speed sync but what it has to say is very sketchy. Pages 13, 129 and 133 are the only references I could find to High Speed Sync and they don't mention shutter speed at all.

If you didn't get a manual with your purchase here's a link to one. Canon EOS Digital Rebel (300D) Manual

Cheers

Steve

Yes, the 300D can do High Speed Sync flash, but you must use an external flash with that option as the camera's built-in flash is not able to do it.

electrolux wrote:

2 Days ago I bought an EOS 300D for £50 from eBay with 18-55mm lens! (bargain), but I've noticed that when I use the internal flash I'm restricted to 1/200sec shutter speed rather than the full 1/4000thsec which I can do without the flash, I presume this is due to the flash being incapable of working fast enough (correct me if I am wrong).

Thanks for the invitation.

It's not really the flash, it's the shutter. It is comprised of two physical "curtains" that chase each other across the sensor (the first one begins to expose the sensor, then 1/S seconds later the second one begins to cover the sensor). The on-board flash fires a single pulse of light to illuminate the subject. 1/200 is the shortest time in which the whole sensor is exposed at the same instant. If the camera would let you fire the on-board flash at say 1/4000, the image would be a glimpse of the subject through a narrow slit between two black shadows.

Does that mean if I get an external high-speed flash/speedlight (meaning one capable of such speed) will I be able to use the high shutter speed with a flash?

Yep, an HSS flash fires a series of pulses so that the subject is illuminated more or less continuously while the sensor sees it through the moving slit.

Thanks for all the reply s. I did get a manual with it and as you say it's pretty sketchy about it. So basically what I've gathered from all the reply s is that I do need to get a higher speed flash so anyone got any affordable suggestions (I'm on money I get from eBay sales which is fine considering I'm 13!).

The Yongnuo YN-500EX is about the cheapest new flash you will find with HSS. The YN-568EX, YN-568EX II, and YN-600EX RT also all have HSS.

You should be able to find a used Canon 380EX or 420EX for less than $100. The 430EX, 430EX II, 580EX, 580EX II, 600EX RT also all have HSS.

electrolux wrote:

2 Days ago I bought an EOS 300D for £50 from eBay with 18-55mm lens! (bargain), but I've noticed that when I use the internal flash I'm restricted to 1/200sec shutter speed rather than the full 1/4000thsec which I can do without the flash, I presume this is due to the flash being incapable of working fast enough (correct me if I am wrong). Does that mean if I get an external high-speed flash/speedlight (meaning one capable of such speed) will I be able to use the high shutter speed with a flash?

Others have covered the whys & wherefores of needing HSS at faster shutter speeds but I'm going to ask why do you think you need a faster shutter speed?  Flash duration is typically around 1/1000th (flash power/duration is another subject), so at sync speed indoor typically the flash is providing all the illumination and it doesn't matter that much whether you are using 1/100th or 1/200th shutter speed, or 1/1000th shutter speed.

However if you were outdoor where with no flash you needed a shutter speed of more than 1/200th then wanted flash as well to illuminate shadows you'd need HSS.  The power of an external flash will drop off massively as it is basically a series of low power pulses.

So again it is worth asking - why do you (think you) need the higher speed?  What are you photographing?

Well I haven't got anything particularly in mind but kind of... an apple or stone falling in to water, that kind of thing.

I'm interested in high speed photography like this...

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/99/Michael_Melgar_LiquidArt_resize_droplet.jpg

electrolux wrote:

I'm interested in high speed photography like this...

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/99/Michael_Melgar_LiquidArt_resize_droplet.jpg

That photo was not taken with a high shutter speed. The short duration of the flash is what freezes the subject.

msowsun wrote:

electrolux wrote:

I'm interested in high speed photography like this...

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/99/Michael_Melgar_LiquidArt_resize_droplet.jpg

That photo was not taken with a high shutter speed. The short duration of the flash is what freezes the subject.

In fact the shutter speed according to the EXIF was 2sec and it appears the flash was OFF camera.  I suggest to electrolux that he re-reads my earlier response then researches flash to understand the basics.

Thanks for all that, I did get some of it & it told me quite a few things such as, if you set your S.Speed to 1/30 in a darkroom & your flash to say... 1/400 it's the flash which is actually freezing the subject.

Here's a photo I took yesterday with my EOS 300D of a golf ball falling into a glass of water. @ 1/200 sec.

Here's a photo I took without an external flash/speedlight.

Firstly is HSS 'high speed steel' or 'high speed sync' (Don't bother replying to that one!)

Yes I don't need a higher shutter speed than 1/1000sec but my EOS still doesn't do that with flash which I need for indoor photography otherwise I'll get a black square.

Here is a photo I took with 1/200sec & NO external speedlight etc.

1/200sec

electrolux wrote:

Firstly is HSS 'high speed steel' or 'high speed sync' (Don't bother replying to that one!)

Yes I don't need a higher shutter speed than 1/1000sec but my EOS still doesn't do that with flash which I need for indoor photography otherwise I'll get a black square.

Here is a photo I took with 1/200sec & NO external speedlight etc.

1/200sec

somehow I think you still don't understand everything.

When you take a picture, the shutter opens fully (which can be in the range from 1/200 sec to 30 seconds or even longer). When the shutter is open, the flash fires for a short duration (in the range of 1/320 to 1/6000 sec, see e.g. http://speedlights.net/2011/03/30/canon-430ex-ii/) - the duration is determined by measuring a short preflash (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canon_EOS_flash_system). So the flash length is set by how much light is needed. If you want to adjust flash intensity manually, you can do that on an external flash (internal not possible) but you don't set a time, but intensity level, since flash light not linear (it ramps up and goes down not instantly). The camera shutter speed has nothing to do with the flash at all, it just must open the shutter long enough to capture the flash duration over the full image. You don't set the flash speed with the shutter speed setting.

most cameras have such shutter limits, not just the 300D.

electrolux wrote:

Firstly is HSS 'high speed steel' or 'high speed sync' (Don't bother replying to that one!)

Yes I don't need a higher shutter speed than 1/1000sec but my EOS still doesn't do that with flash which I need for indoor photography otherwise I'll get a black square.

Yes you will get a black square because at faster than sync speed the shutter is a moving slit and the non-hss flash has fired whilst some of the picture is blocked off. This is what happens with ALL DSLRs.

Try http://www.johnaldred.com/what-is-sync-speed/ and see if that explains it for you.

Here is a photo I took with 1/200sec & NO external speedlight etc.

Yes, the flash now is determining the exposure.  You would have likely got the same if you had shot at 1/100th.  But with an external flash you can reduce the strength of the flash to give an even shorter exposure time.