When I select FP mode on my 550 EX Speedlite, the correct icon (lightning flash with an 'H' next to it) appears on the display of the flash unit, but the viewfinder in my EOS 3 only shows a flash icon, i.e. without the 'H' next to it. According to the user manual of both the camera and the flash, there is nothing else required to do to enter FP mode than simply pressing the two +/- buttons on the flash unit simultaneously. Still, despite an entire afternoon of playing around with all possible permutations, I cannot get the correct icon in the viewfinder.

Do you suppose this means that the camera does not recognize the command to go to FP mode? Or is there perhaps some obscure setting that I have missed to correctly engage FP mode?

Your advice and/or suggestions will be most sincerely appreciated.

Regards,

Peter

-- Peter J. Van Zyl (pvanzyl@earthlink.net), December 24, 2000

Answers

It works for me. I set the flash to FP and set the camera to M and 1/1000 sec and the H appears in the viewfinder. Try M or Tv. Or in Av, set your aperture to f22 in daylight.

Paul

-- Paul Ferrara (paul@columbusoft.com), December 25, 2000.

Paul,

Thanks for the answer. I think I got it figured out now. The display in the viewfinder only indicates an 'H' next to the flash icon when the shutter speed actually exceeds 1/200, perhaps as a way to let the user know that he/she is now entering the high speed mode. Under all other conditions the 'H' is not displayed.

When I was checking out the system, the indoors light level was too low to get the shutter speed to 1/200, which explained why I could not get the 'H' displayed. The next day in bright sunlight it worked as advertised...

Thanks again.

-- Peter van Zyl (pvanzyl@earthlink.net), December 26, 2000.