Advice please re Canon flash commander (ST-E2)

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AlistairW

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I've just gone daft and bought myself a Canon Wireless Flash Commander. It has just arrived, seems straightforward and seems to be triggering my 430EX speedlight fine.

I'm wondering though if you can use it to trigger a non-Canon cheapo second flashgun. I appreciate that if it does this it would at best be manual flash only - but can it do it at all?

I like the idea of trying a 2 flash setup, but having blown so much money on the ST-E2, I don't want to shell out for another speedlight just yet (ironic, eh?)

Alistair
 
Have a little look for optical slaves. I've got some wein peanuts (I know they sound weird!) but there are a few companies who do them. They simply plug into the second flash and trigger off the first. As you say, that one will be manual and might just mess up the exposure from the primary flash if that's ETTL.

It depends on whether you intend to shoot ETTL or manual really.

Hope that helps.
 
So, you can't just exppect any cheap flash to work then? Thanks for this - I'll have a look at these optical slaves.

Thanks

Alistair
 
From my tinkerings with the ST-E2 you will struggle

When firing your 430EX you are doing it in ETTL mode, which emits a preflash. This will trigger any optical slave you have set up. I'm not 100% certain but I am pretty sure the ST-E2 will not fire EX flashes set up in manual mode.
 
RichardtheSane said:
From my tinkerings with the ST-E2 you will struggle

When firing your 430EX you are doing it in ETTL mode, which emits a preflash. This will trigger any optical slave you have set up. I'm not 100% certain but I am pretty sure the ST-E2 will not fire EX flashes set up in manual mode.
Click to expand...

The ST-E2 will trigger a slaved 430EX which is in manual mode. The 430EX can then trigger another non-Canon flash using a regular optical trigger as the 430EX won't emit a pre-flash in manual mode (and the ST-E2 shouldn't trigger an optical slave with its near-IR pre-flashes).

Of course this is a pricey way to trigger manual only flashes!

Best wishes,

Tim
 
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