I bought the 580EX after reading some good reviews about it. I still had my doubts, after all, it's only an on-camera flash! Well, the truth is, my flash photography has never been so good and accurate!
OUT OF THE BOX
In the box you get the flash head, a pouch, a manual and a stand for the flash. All is neatly packaged.
FIRST TEST
After struggling with the battery compartment flap, I managed to insert the 4 AA batteries and turn the unit on. The start up charge is very fast, in fact one of the fastest I've seen.I fired some shots, head on, all in automatic mode. The recycling times were also excellent (even better if you use the external battery pack). The exposure was very accurate, colours were accurate but the results were very "flashey". I expected this, after all it's a small source of light.
SECOND TEST
I then decided to use some bounce flash, using a white ceiling and the white pad that can be pulled out from the top of the flash head. I was very impressed! No nasty shadows and a very homogenous light on the subjects. Again, excellent exposure. The reason for this is the zoom function on the flash, which, after you tilt the head of the flash, changes the power of the flash burst. The result was fantastic, close to a studio flash (an average one..).
FEATURES
You can get these from the Canon website, but if your camera supports it, the best one is the E-TTL II metering system, which uses distance info from your lenses. The result is an extremely accurate exposure, be it with mixed light (ambient and flash) or just flash. The ability to light up the LCD is one I didn't really pay any attention until I had to cover a Halloween party... It was pitch black and I wanted to change the flash exposure compensation - it's very useful!
SETTINGS
All the settings are very easy to use and change. I had grasped most of them in 10 minutes of reading the manual and trying them out on the unit. Anything from flash exposure compensation to stroboscopic flash can be set via the very useful dial on the back of the unit. Also custom functions can be selected, as you do on any EOS cameras. You can select second curtain sync, manual mode, etc....
CONCLUSION
For anyone with an EOS digital camera, this is the best flash you can get. With the 20D and 1D mk II (if I'm not mistaken) the flash automatically changes the width of the flash, based on the size of the camera's sensor.
Build quality is very good, in line with Canon's standards. It is a bit expensive (paid £299.98 from a local camera shop), but the big range, features and full integration with your camera, make it a very good deal.
It's as easy to use as a camera's built in flash, but with the power of a studio flash.
Highly recommended.
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Further development of Canon's flagship Speedlite has led to theproduction of the ... more
580 EX II. This is the premier Speedlite for allphotographers including professionals. Newly designed to matchwith the EOS-1D Mark III in terms of improved dust- an...
Postage & Packaging: £3.46 Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days...
Advantages: Very powerful and flexible advanced users flash gun, easy full-auto use. Disadvantages: Expensive, complicated parameters setting, can cause subjects to blink.
Advantages: Very powerful and flexible advanced users flash gun, easy full-auto use. Disadvantages: Expensive, complicated parameters setting, can cause subjects to blink.
Oct 30th, 2005
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