I was wondering why the flash exposures I get with my K10D and Sigma EF500 DG Super aren't as reliable as those I got in the hazy past with my PZ-1(p) and ancient (but TTL capable) Sunpak flash.
So I repeated an experiment I had performed with the PZ-1p and Sunpak: I had two targets of similar shade, one close (~1.5m) and one distant (~5m) in the same ambient light in the same room. Focusing on the near target and photographing it led to a perfectly exposed near target and underexposed distant target (which is as it should be). Focusing on the distant target led to a perfectly exposed distant target and overexposed near target, even though the two targets had the same positions in the frame in the two situations. This told me that the PZ-1(p) used distance information from the lens in calculating flash exposure. Last evening I performed the experiment with the K10D and Sigma flash. No matter which target I focused on, the near target was always properly exposed and the distant target underexposed. Thus it appears that this camera-flash combination does not use distance information in its flash exposure calculations. It would be interesting if someone with a Pentax 540 flash would try the same experiment. Is it the camera or the Sigma (reverse-engineered) flash that is unable to use the distance information? Rick http://www.photo.net/photos/RickW -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
