The control burst immediately follows the metering burst. The purpose of the control burst is to communicate the results of the exposure calculation to the remote flashes. The camera's metering system then reads the light reflected by the scene and calculates what the intensity of the remote flashes would need to be in order to produce the correct exposure.Ĥ.
#Minolta camera flash manual#
Any remote flash set to manual mode will ignore this command. The onboard flash sends a burst instructing the remote flashes to fire a pre-flash at a specified intensity. The purpose of the metering burst is to obtain a meter reading of the scene. (In addition, the onboard flash may also illuminate several times prior to the metering burst to assist with autofocusing or red-eye reduction but those features are not part of the wireless flash system.)ģ. The three bursts are usually perceived as one continuous flash since they're so brief and close together but they are separate. These low-power bursts consist of multiple short pulses that the remote flashes understand as instructions. It fires a metering burst just before the exposure a control burst immediately afterwards and a sync burst during the exposure (with one exception regarding High Speed Sync or HSS, described later). When used as a wireless controller, the onboard flash always fires at least three times. Those configurations work only with Minolta film cameras.Ģ. Other Minolta shoe mounted flash units cannot be used as controllers, and neither can the Minolta Wireless Remote Flash Controller.
![minolta camera flash minolta camera flash](http://forum.mflenses.com/userpix/201412/big_5918_DSC00213_1.jpg)
The most common way to control the wireless flash system is with the camera's onboard flash. If you haven't, then you're probably either not yet informed enough to benefit from what you find here, or you're far too smart to need it! I won't attempt to explain the details of guide numbers, off-the-film metering, flash synchronization with focal plane shutters, optical flash triggers, HSS, or a few other relevant things that I hope you already know about and understand.ġ. Speaking of user manuals, I'm going to assume that you have already read yours - for both camera and flash - front to back, at least a couple of times. It's basic but useful knowledge about how the products behave. This is definitely not a complete and detailed technical explanation of the system! Rather, readers should think of this as just a couple of pages that Minolta and its successors neglected to include in their camera and flash user manuals. This information should apply whenever using the built-in wireless flash system of any Konica Minolta or Sony DSLR available to date in conjunction with the Minolta 5600HS (D), 3600HS (D), Sony HVL-F60M, F58AM, F56AM, F43AM/F43M, F42AM, F36AM, F32M, or F20AM/F20M (those last two models can function on some cameras as a controller, but not as a remote flash). I hope to address that here with a handful of essential facts that curious photographers should know about our wireless flash system as implemented in DSLRs - practical information that should answer some persistent questions and eliminate some lingering misconceptions. There has been much mystery and confusion about how it all works, which could easily have been avoided with just a little more care in creating the product user manuals. And a direct descendant of that system, originally designed for autofocus film cameras, was and still is employed in all the DSLRs and wireless flashes later produced by Konica Minolta and Sony. But strangely, all three companies have done a poor job promoting an appreciation for, and understanding of, their invention.
![minolta camera flash minolta camera flash](https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/EWEAAOSwnK9ZS-dM/s-l300.jpg)
Minolta's groundbreaking wireless flash system was first introduced in the early 1990's. Konica Minolta / Sony DSLR Wireless Flash Facts