Canon 70D remote flash trigger

[tamernagy]

Which Canon speed light will work off camera and be triggered by the in camera remote flash trigger feature ??

[Skirball]

270II, 320, 430II, 580II, and 600.  I'd think the 430 and 580 mark I would too, but I'm not sure.

[tamernagy]

I mean without using the native flash as a trigger. The Canon 70D has a built in wireless remote trigger. Are you sure all these models will work wirelessly with the 70D ??

[Skirball]

No, no camera on the market does that yet (but there's no reason why not, ahem Canon).  You need a unit in the hotshoe, like the ST-E3, a Canon flash, or a third party trigger to do that.

[TCampbell · Accepted solution]

The native (built-in) flash IS the trigger.  This is an optical trigger and requires line-of-sight to the off-camera flash.  

The 430EX II can be a "slave" (remotely triggered flash) but cannot be a master.  The 580EX II can be a master or a slave.  The 600EX-RT can also be a master or a slave (and can do optical or radio but radio requires a radio trigger -- Canon sells a dedicated ST-E3-RT radio trigger or another 600EX-RT flash can be used as a master/trigger.

The built-in flash uses pulses of light (visible light) to communicate with the slaves and send instructions.  It's not infra-red nor radio.  But receiver in the slave flashes is on the lower body (not up in the flash head).  The front of the lower body has a red-tinted panel which resemlbes what you'd see on an IR remote control -- leading people to presume that it's IR.  It is actually visible light -- not IR.

If the remote light doesn't fire when the on-camera flash fires then the lower unit may not have a good light of sight.  Keep in mind the 430EX II, 580EX II, and 600EX-RT all have a flash head which can tilt AND rotate left-right.  This means you can rotate the lower body of the flash so that it points at your camera but still rotate the head so that it points at your subject. 

[Digimik]

Ahh...I think I understand now. I have a Yongnuo Speedlite YN560-III which I believe is similar and I've gotten it to work being connected to the shoe and also being triggered by the 70D's builtin flash but I've trying to figure out (and reading a lot online) about getting the Speedlite to fire remotely WITHOUT the 70D's builtin flash being fired. I don't understand what the point of an external flash being fired by the camera's builtin flash because for me, the whole point of an external flash is so the builtin flash DOES NOT fire as that sort of lighting doesn't look good. I like the bounced flash from the external. But maybe I'm missing a benefit of having the builti flash fire AND the external flash fire? I just don't like the internal flash look at all. 

In trying to make the the external flash fire remotely without the internal flash being fired is an assumption on my part that since the 70D is sending wifi data (if enabled) and also IR signal, it would fire the Speedlite. But apparently, it seems I STILL need some sort of trigger to be placed on the shoe or at least, a cable?? 

Lastly, the 70D has quite a flash menu in C mode. But that didn't seem to do anything. 

Thanks for all your help people. The 70D is quite a tool. But it's quite deep too! 🙂 

[MikeSowsun]

The Yongnuo YN-560-III is a manual flash and it is not compatible with the Canon's own wireless flash system, but it can still be used for wireless flash in a more basic form.

The yn-560 is also not compatible with the built-in flash menu in your camera when it is in the camera hotshoe.

The yn-560 III CAN do radio wireless flash (RX mode), but only with the Yongnuo RF-602 or RF-603 wireless triggers. 

The YN560 can do slave flash with your camera, but it is a very basic form of slave flash where it will respond when it sees a bright flash of light from your camera's flash or any other flash it sees.

In order to use the YN-560 with your Canon camera you must set the camera's on-board flash to normal ETTL flash or normal Manual flash. (Make sure your camera flash is not set to wireless because the addition optical wireless "Flash Commands" will just confuse the YN-560 and it will not sync properly)

The YN-560 does have two settings for optical slave flash:

"S 1" is used when you have your camera's flash set to manual mode. The YN-560 will then sync at the speed of light to match the flash from your camera.

"S2" is used if you have your camera's flash set to ETTL. The YN-560 will ignore the first ETTL preflash and then fire when it sees the main flash from your camera.

To avoid seeing the flash from your camera in your photos, adjust your camera's flash to a low power setting or use a piece of white cardboard to deflect to camera flash away from your subject.

[Digimik]

MikeSowsun: What an amazingly generous reply. So helpful. Thanks for the time you took to give me this insight. I appreciate your experiences and how they've now taught me. Many Blessings...Michael

[TGR10]

Hey Mike,

I did everything to said on your post. I have the YN-560-III and the ANd the Yongnuo RF-603 wireless triggers. I disable the flash wireless in my camara and still I have not be able to use the flash. 

What else I can do?

Thank you.

[arlin411]

Years ago I had a similar need.  I put a red filter (don't remember the number) over the camera's flash.  It would still trigger the remote but would not affect the image.

The problem was that this was at a dance recital where all the moms came with their little point & shoot cameras. Every time they took a (flash) picture, it triggered my remotes.  😞  Radio would have been nice.

-Arlin