My experience is somewhat similar, even though I do quite a bit of flash photography at weddings and events. If I am just doing daylight fill, then the AF360FGZ or AF540FGZ work very well as they can be dialed for compensation and support hi speed synch. Basically just dial in the amount of fill you want on the flash and start shooting just as if the flash wasn't there.
When the flash is the primary light source, things change quite a bit. TTL or P-TTL on my *istD were fairly inconsistent. Not that I couldn't get a usable image, but that I couldn't get consistent exposure - usually underexposed. Since getting the K10D, I have shot two weddings using the AF400T in auto mode and have gotten a much better exposure overall and fairly consistent. I do kind of wonder how well the AF540FGZ would do in comparison. There is one benefit to the TTL method, although I don't know how well the P-TTL would actually work - that is when using light modifiers - especially strong ones - the theory is that the light hitting the sensor is measured for the exposure. But some of the light modifiers can eat up 2-3 stops of light. Since the P-TTL is a quicker, weaker flash, I could see how it might get misread. Can't say that I have really experimented enough to know but I could see some problems. -- Best regards, Bruce Monday, March 5, 2007, 7:19:36 AM, you wrote: GD> I use a non-dedicated auto flash and/or manual multi-flash setup with GD> a flash meter, or just look at a preview exposure with histogram. I GD> have not seen much benefit in using a TTL or even P-TTL flash at all. GD> Where having a P-TTL compatible flash is of some interest to me is GD> that they support high speed sync for daylight fill. GD> I've seen both Nikon, Canon and other manufacturers go through GD> successive incompatible generations of auto-TTL flash metering GD> systems. Don't see why Pentax would be any exception. It's an area GD> where a lot of development is ongoing. GD> G GD> On Mar 5, 2007, at 1:42 AM, Henk Terhell wrote: >> Agreed. It is only that flash on my istD is so much easier to use and >> more accurate. I will have to live with the many miss hits because I >> keep forgetting to switch camera and flash modes. Or buy a P-TTL >> flash. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
