Are Slave Flashes Triggered By Other Peoples Flashes?

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Snap_Happy:)

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I'm looking at getting a wireless slave flash for my Panasonic Lumix FZ28 as it does not have a hot shoe, and I have been disappointed with range of the built in flash.

I mainly need a greater flash coverage distance for Carnival Procession walkers, aswell as large group photos, both at night. The longer the flash distance the better I think.

As far as I understand, wireless slave flashes have a sensor which is triggered by another external flash source - i.e. my built in flash?
My main concern is whether wireless slave flash units are triggered by OTHER PEOPLES camera flashes standing nearby, as there are alot of other people using their camera flashes aswell?

I am looking at the Super Fire Slave Flash :http://www.photo24.co.uk/product.asp?P_ID=4166&PT_ID=1497&numPageStartPosition=1&strShowBackLink=n

A bit more info here:http://www.bugeyedigital.com/product_main/bow-sfd828.html

Is there an auto setting on these wireless slave flashes, because I don't know if I'm going to have time to keep changing the distance / output settings?


I would be grateful for any advice, maybe there are better / cheaper flash units available?
 
A remote flash gun will only be triggered by other people's flashes if it has an inbuilt optical slave, such as some of the Nikon units!
 
So can I assume that the Flash I'm looking at DOESN'T have an inbuilt optical slave?
 
Looking at it, I'm not too sure... as it says it is triggered simultaneously as your on board flash... best waiting for someone a little more clued up :(
 
It's not very clear from the first web site what they mean by "3 Flash Detect configurations"

However, the second site states its optical, please see below:

If your camera manual states you can't connect a flash via a hot shoe / sync cable / pc cable or a radio transmitter I believe the only way your camera will be able to trigger an external flash gun is by the means of setting its own flash off, so a flash gun with an optical slave cell can pick up the flash of light and trigger the gun to fire its flash, which means that any other flash (on another camera) nearby will set this flash off, which I think would be the death of many batteries and the unit itself if over worked. The optical flash cell works by picking up a cameras flash then fires off itself.

I hope that helps :)
 
Snap_Happy:) said:
As far as I understand, wireless slave flashes have a sensor which is triggered by another external flash source - i.e. my built in flash?
Click to expand...

Do a Google search for "YONGNUO"

They do a remote that fires flash via wireless and can be used as a remote shutter release as well. It works at a frequency of 2.4 GHz and has a reported range of up to half a mile. I have used it at 200 yards/metres and it works well for me.

Hope this helps

Ron

Sorry. Just read you do not have hot shoe so its irrelevant.
 
I have checked the owner's manual for your camera, the remote trigger which is a radio remote (as above) will not work, the only type which I can see working with your camera is a flash with an optical slave cell, see Pages 48 - 52 in your manual, also Panasonic do not list an external flash gun in their accessories for your camera, if one would work with your camera I think they would be selling it.
 
I have a Lumix DMC-FX33 and use a metz 28CS-2 to great effect, you set the flash to your camera flash sequence!
 
As some of the others have said, an optical trigger will fire with any other flash so you may run into problems (not to mention mess up the other people's exposures).

Since you don't have a hotshoe then you can't use a wireless trigger or even a cable but you might be able to borrow a trick used by scuba divers who have many of the same contraints as you...

Have a hunt for a fibre-optic cable - you can fix one end over your inbuilt flash and the other end can sit over the optical trigger of the flashgun - cover the excess space with some electrical tape to avoid it being triggered by other flashes if you need to.
This should give you the effect of a wired flashgun but using the optical triggers that you're stuck with.


The other thing to mention is about your comment on automatic settings - your inbuilt flash or one that is in a hotshoe will normally work using something like eTTL which meters the exposure as the shutter is up and automatically controls the flash level to give you something about right.
You're not going to be able to do this so you need to use manual settings on the flash and camera since neither of them will 'know' about the flash firing.
 
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