Flash Bracket For Twin Flash Guns?

[georgedingwall]

Hi all,

I already have a Nikon SB800 flash gun, and have just picked up another one cheap on ebay.

Does anyone know if there is such a thing as a twin flash bracket?

I want to put together a rig that I can use for outdoor macro work, and want to use the two SB800s with my Nikon D200. I want to be able to mount both guns at the same time, one either side of the lens.

I know I can make something for myself, but if there is something out there that would do, I would rather take the easy way out.

Thanks for any help.

[Mike B in OKlahoma]

They are around. One used to have George Lepp's name attached to it (not sure that is made anymore) and Really Right Stuff makes some custom flash brackets:

http://reallyrightstuff.com/tutorials/macro/index.html

These things tend not to be cheap, if you can make a satisfactory one yourself, you'll probably come out ahead.

[georgedingwall]

Hi Mike,

Thanks for the link.

I think I've found what I was looking for. Someone on a Nikon forum that I subscribe to gave me this link.

http://www.speedgraphic.co.uk/prod.asp? ... sh+Bracket

This bracket should do what I want.

Thanks.

[Carl_Constantine]

That bracket also looks pretty universal, should work on any camera/flash system.

[georgedingwall]

Hi Karl,

That bracket also looks pretty universal, should work on any camera/flash system.

It is universal Karl, and has quite a large range of adjustment. It is also able to pivot the camera between landscape and portrait orientation without having to re-adjust the flash guns.

I ordered one yesterday, and it arrived at lunchtime today. It works fine with my D200 and pair of SB800s.

The only problem I've found is that I cannot use FP Synch on the camera when the camera is acting as commander for the two SB800s. I don't know if this is how it's supposed to be or if I have not found the setting yet. The work around I've used for now, is to designate one of the guns as the commander and the other as the remote. I then connect the commander flash to the camera using an off-camera SC17 cord.

In order to do this I had to remove one of the hotshoe adapters from the bracket and drill a clearance hole through the bracket so that I could use a tripod screw to attach the commander flash to the bracket.

This now enables me to use the FP synch option and get shutter speeds of upto 1/8000 sec with enough ttl flash power to capture my macro subjects. Who needs vibration reduction when you work at these speeds.

Bye for now.

[Carl_Constantine]

Hi Karl,

just FYI, It's Carl with a C :-)

This now enables me to use the FP synch option and get shutter speeds of upto 1/8000 sec with enough ttl flash power to capture my macro subjects. Who needs vibration reduction when you work at these speeds.

Bye for now.

Holy cow that's fast! I think I've had shutter speeds of 1/4000s or 1/6000s before, but not 1/8000s. Does your flash actually sync that fast? My flash unit supports high-speed sync, but the manual doesn't say how fast it will sync.

[rjlittlefield]

Carl, FP sync is an interesting trick.

See http://www.photomacrography1.net/forum/ ... 12&start=8 for an explanation that I tracked down a year ago.

George, does that writeup match your understanding of how your equipment works?

--Rik

BTW, it's probably worth mentioning that at least one Nikon camera, the D70, has a CCD electronic shutter in addition to the standard mechanical shutter. That allows the D70 to sync at its fastest shutter speed even without an FP-mode flash. You can find out more by Googling on nikon d70 "ccd shutter" flash . But as far as I can tell the D200 just has an old-fashioned mechanical shutter, so requires an FP flash to work at high speeds.

[georgedingwall]

Hi Carl,

just FYI, It's Carl with a C :-)

Sorry for the slip. I have a friend who spells his name Karl, so I was probably just typing on auto-pilot.

Does your flash actually sync that fast?

It seems to. When I shoot a t 1/8000 sec, that's the shutter speed value that's quoted in the exif info.

Hi Rik,

George, does that writeup match your understanding of how your equipment works?

Pretty much Rik. I hadn't really thought that much about how you get FP Synch speeds, but it is a very clever way of getting around the normal flash synch speed limit.

I didn't know that the D70 worked in the way you describe. I have a D70, but have never used it for FP synch, even though I had a SB800 at the time.

It's worth mentioning, that the highest shutter speeds don't give very good results at more than a few feet from the camera unless you shoot wide open. But you can stop down to F8 or F11 and still get good exposures in the close range of a macro lens. Having two SB800s mounted either side of the lens gives plenty of light and speed for hand holding the camera in an outdoor situation where it is impractical to use a tripod or monopod.

I'll post some results when I get any images worth posting. The first chill of winter is just creeping in where I live, so natural things are beginning to go dormant. I may have to find some interesting inanimate objects instead.

Bye for now.

[Roy Patience]

George,

If you are interested in building your own flash bracket, this link has easy to follow plans:

http://biology.fullerton.edu/people/sta ... y-bracket/

Kirk makes another bracket, but it is pretty expensive:

http://www.kirkphoto.com/brackets.html#fb8

I have been in the process of building a bracket out of two inexpensive flash brackets and some tiny ballheads. The brackets are the simple flat ones that screw into the tripod socket of the camera and have a flash shoe that is about six inches away. You attach one bracket to the camera, add a ball-head one the flash shoe, then add another bracket to the top of the ball-head and, finally, attach the flash to the second bracket. The ball-heads allow you to position the flash off to the side or above the lens. I wish I had a picture of this since this explanation must be difficult to comprehend.

I would be interested in your exerience with the SB-800 flash. I don't know whether to buy an SB-600 or SB-800.

Roy

[georgedingwall]

Hi Roy,

If you are interested in building your own flash bracket, this link has easy to follow plans:

I've already bought a manfrotto twin flash bracket from this link.

http://www.speedgraphic.co.uk/prod.asp? ... sh+Bracket

I would be interested in your exerience with the SB-800 flash. I don't know whether to buy an SB-600 or SB-800.

I've not used the SB600, so I don't know much about it.

The SB800 has more power, a faster recycle time, fewer flashes per set of batteries at the same output level. The SB800 can act as commander to other remote flashes, I don't think the SB600 can do this.

I haven't done many images with the double flash setup at the moment. I think it will be OK for what I want to do with it. It's quite awkward handling the camera with two flashes mounted. I think some sort of pistol grip would be useful.

I'm sure I'll get used to it with practice. At the moment I'm finding it hard to get a really good consistent exposure. I'm a little confused with the TTL/Manual settings that are available. I'm not getting very consistent results just yet, but I think this will also be resolved with a bit more experience.

Good luck with your flash bracket. Bye for now.

[DaveW]

Right George, now you have your flash bracket, which do you think is the cheapest and best way to go with a Nikon D200. Buying a twin flash bracket plus two dedicated flashes and using the pop-up flash as Commander unit, or Nikon's R1:-

http://www.kenrockwell.com/nikon/r1c1.htm

The reason I ask is though my 60mm micro nikkor can support the R1 by it's filter threads Nikon say do not use the R1 or R1C1 on my 70-180 zoom micro nikkor because it is too heavy. The 70-180 has plastic filter threads and the barrel extends too much on close-up's to safely bear the weight. Given that, it would seem I can probably get the same effect with twin dedicated flasguns on the Manfroto bracket for both lenses?

In days gone by the advantage of attaching the flashes to the lens was the exposure stayed the same as the magnification altered because the flashes moved closer to the subject with the lens. With TTL flash control however surely this will take care of any light reductions as the lens extends further?

Pleased the bracket was what you wanted.

DaveW

[georgedingwall]

Hi Dave,

Right George, now you have your flash bracket, which do you think is the cheapest and best way to go with a Nikon D200. Buying a twin flash bracket plus two dedicated flashes and using the pop-up flash as Commander unit, or Nikon's R1:-

I went down the twin flash route because I already had a SB800. If you have to buy 2 flash guns, then it may be more economical to get the R1.

I do wonder about how big an effect the weight right at the end of the lens will have on stability with the RI. I think that the D200 pop-up flash can also control the R1, so there would be no need to also by the SU800 commander module.

I'm not sure how useful the SB-R200 flash units would be in a non macro situation. The power output seems quite small. If you don't need, or already have, a flash for normal camera use, then the R1 without the commander unit would seem to be the less expensive way to go. My main problem with this unit is that you are tied into a limited set of lenses, although I think you can aslo use the flashguns of-camera as well.

The reason I like the twin flash bracket approach, is that I can put any lens on the camera and still have the guns in the place I want. I could even reverse mount an enlarger lens and still make use of both guns.

In days gone by the advantage of attaching the flashes to the lens was the exposure stayed the same as the magnification altered because the flashes moved closer to the subject with the lens. With TTL flash control however surely this will take care of any light reductions as the lens extends further?

Although you can use these flash guns in ttl mode, I've not found the accuracy of exposure very good so far. I've had better results switching them to manual mode and then choosing the appropriate output level. You can do this on the camera or the gun.

As for the flash moving with the lens, some modern lenses have internal focussing and zooming, so the exposure should remain the same for any lens in these circumstances.

You'll have to make a decision that's right for your circumstances Dave. If I were starting from scratch, I'd try to get a couple of used SB800s and a flash bracket. It seems to me that solution would provide a bit more power and flexibility.

Let us know which way you go. Bye for now.

[DaveW]

Thanks George, as I said I can only use the R1 on one of my macro lenses according to Nikon, so a bracket would allow me to use dual flash with both.

Can you tell me how far the flash arms on the Manfroto extend forward from the tripod socket centre? With the 70-180 micro nikkor fully extended for close-up on the D200 it is around 10" from tripod socket centre to lens front and the arms would need to be a little longer to get the flashes clear of the lens end to light the subject. I am thinking of flash for insects in this case.

DaveW

[georgedingwall]

Hi Dave,

Can you tell me how far the flash arms on the Manfroto extend forward from the tripod socket centre? DaveW

The distance from the plane of the tripod socket to the mounting shoe is approx 8". Using the SB800, you can add another couple of inches for the distance from the hot shoe to the front of the flash.

Obviously if you push the guns away from the camera you lose some distance depending on how far your rotate the arm. The arms also slide in and out.

How close will your subject be to the 70-180 micro nikkor? I'm assuming it will be a few inches. If that's the case, then having the guns behind the line of the front of the lens should not be a problem, as there should still be an uninterupted light path between the flash and the subject.

Here's an image of my setup with the arms rotated to about 45 deg.

The lens used in this shot is a Sigma 70-200 F2.8 non-macro lens, and the distance from the tripod screw to the front of this lens is about 9 inches. Both my macro lenses are shorter than this, so I have a bit more room than suggested by this image.

You should be able to judge the dimesions of your own equipment from this.

Hope this helps.

[DaveW]

Thanks George. I have just looked up the specifications for the 70-180 micro nikkor. It says:-

Technical Highlights: -

2,6X telephoto zoom micro lens
Up to 0.75x reproduction ratio
Closest focus distance approximately 37cm throughout zoom range
Effective f-number does not vary with focusing
Picture composition easier than with single focal length micro lenses
Reproduction ratio can be controlled without changing camera position
Different perspectives of same subject easily obtainable
Easy and responsive manual focus operation
Focus range limiter for faster autofocusing
Rounded diaphragm opening makes out-of-focus elements appear more natural
1 x ED glass and Nikon's SIC (Super Integrated Coating) ensures high-contrast pictures, with better colour balance even at large apertures
Rotatable tripod mounting collar provided
Life-size (1:1) magnification at 180mm is possible by attaching close-up attachment lens No. 6T.

As you can see the closest focusing distance is around 37cm, that gives quite a bit in front of the lens so the bracket will probably be OK. Though it is only a 70-180 it is quite a big beast, but not quite as big and heavy as the 200mm micro nikkor.

Thanks again,

DaveW