I'm fairly new to photography and I have heard that getting the flash off of the camera will improve the quality of my shots. I own a Nikon N60 and mainly shoot portraits with a 105 DC. Can anyone recommend a bracket and what TTL cable to use? Does Sunpak or another company make them for Nikon? Thanks in advance.

-- Justin Espinosa (justinespinosa@aol.com), July 13, 2000

Answers

The cord is called a Nikon SC-17. There are dozens of different flash brackets that swing up and down and pivot, etc. Its also nice to get a diffuser of some type to soften up the intensity of the flash tube. Are there any pro cameras stores near you where you can go and handle these things? That's the best way to find one that you will be comfortable with.

-- Andrew Schank (aschank@flash.net), July 13, 2000.

Justin: If your flash has a head that will tilt (and ideally, even swivel) to allow for "bouncing" the flash light off a white ceiling or wall, I would suggest you explore the potentials of bounced flash before investing in a bracket and cables. IMO, a common mistake made by some new-comers is to buy a less expensive hot-shoe flash that does not feature a tilting or (better yet) a tilting/swiveling flash head. Suppose you want to bounce a hot-shoe mounted flash's light output onto a white ceiling in order to achieve soft, more natural looking lighting. A hot-shoe mounted flash that only "tilts" will allow you to do this so long as you're shooting in a horizontal format. But, what if you want to shoot in a vertical format (which is often very desirable when shooting portraits), but you still want to bounce the flash's light off a white CEILING? Unless the flash head can also "swivel" from side-to-side (thus allowing you to point the flash at the ceiling when holding the camera vertically), you'll have to settle either with: 1) trying to bounce the flash off of a nearby lateral white wall (if one is present, and even then, you may not always like or want the resulting "side-lighting"), or else 2) invest in an off-camera connecting wire (etc.) and then contend with finding a way to position and hold/aim the flash at the ceiling while shooting in the vertical format. Often, when shooting indoors, DIRECT or un-bounced (or undiffused) flash lighting may produce unfavorable results (especially with portraits), as it tends to cast distracting shadows, and is prone to creating "red-eye" as well as a rather harsh "lit" look unless some flash exposure compensation or a "flash diffuser" is employed (the latter is basically nothing more than a plastic translucent cap or hat that is placed over the flash lamp in an effort to diffuse and soften the flash's light). Unfortunately, I'm not able to diagram what I'm talking about here, and if you're still a bit confused about the "geometry" of bounce flash, perhaps other community members can suggest websites or books that illustrate this concept more clearly.

-- kurt heintzelman (heintzelman.1@osu.edu), July 14, 2000.

Kurt just made lot of good points. I have Nikon SB16 which tilts and swivel horizontally, but recently just got a used strobe frame and the SC-17 cord. I haven't yet tried to shoot much with it, but I got it because some poeple suggested that I shoud have the flash off the camera specially over top of the camera either vertical or horizontal shooting results much better results.. I have not tried to shoot much and experiment with it yet, but I guess it would make sense..

I don't know what other guys here would be their opinion..

JK

-- Jin Kim (jkim693433@yahoo.com), July 27, 2000.