SF20 for fill light

henk, as said by several posters, consider getting the flash off-camera via cord, or at least use a diffuser like SFILL. imho, gettting whatever flash you use away from the camera lens axis is the single most important factor in getting pleasing light, most importantly on faces. harry mentions three arms, kiddingly. it's very doable. you shoot f5.6 (gives a bit more DOF), 1/50, close focus by moving your head/body to/fro as needed. not hard at all with a little practice.

remember that aperture controls flash exposure, so to get the kind of lovely facial light in david's picture of the violinist that balances ambient w/flash, you need a combination of dialed down flash, narrower apertures, and slower shutter. indoors, this is actually a benefit of the leica's slow sync speed. it WILL give a fair amount of ambient, at least whatever's there.
 
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Have you thought about getting an auto flash, such as a Nikon SB-26? They're really very simple to use and give excellent results. You set the ISO, aperture on the flash, point the flash at something (wall, ceiling, etc), pull out the bounce card (for highlights) and shoot.
 
There's nothing too limiting about the 1/50th flash sync speed of the M's for interior flash work. It's only a problem when you'd like to use fill flash in sunlight. Contrary to the Luddites, the M actually works quite well with flash.

But going back to the original poster's question, the SF-20 can't be fully utilized on an M6, you need the TTL flash circuitry of the M6TTL or M7 to make use of its best feature, the +/- flash compensation. I wouldn't bother with the SF-20 on an M6, there are better alternatives with swiveling heads which allow for bounce flash.
 
The Vivitar 283 has been my main flash for three decades. The older ones have a high voltage trigger circuit which can fry the electronics in some of today's cameras but any of them will work just fine with a mechanical camera. It has a bounce head, four auto ranges plus manual, and a holder is available for wide angle diffusers or a filter to mimic tungsten light. I bought my two back before 1980 and they still work just fine. There are lots of tricks for giving the illusion of no flash being used.

When the family is in town for the holidays Grandma wants some nice sharp clear photos of the family, and wouldn't know bokeh if it fell out of the sky and hit her on the head. The rest of the year you can play around with creative lighting.
 
I'm a little ticked off that Leica removed TTL flash metering from the new MP. Why on earth cripple the camera? They've had the electronics for 15 years, why not jsut carry them over?

In light of this dare I say that the M6ttl was the most advanced mechanical M body Leica ever made? If the M6ttl had the framelines from an M2/M4 or the new MP3 it would be unbeatable.
 
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memphis said:
when I got my sf-20, there was no diffuser - had a bear of a time and still have not found one -- if anybody has an extra, I'd be happy to take it off their hands....
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I have one on mine and while it does spread the light a little more, it falls far short of producing truly soft light. You really need to use one of the afternarket gadgets from a company like LumaQuest or the SFILL for soft(er) light. Recently I started to experiment with the old index card trick. Bounces most of the light on to the ceilling and a little straight ahead. Not bad at all, but the flash ends up firing mostly on full power, which drains those expensive batteries quickly.
 
Harry Lime said:
I'm a little ticked off that Leica removed TTL flash metering from the new MP. Why on earth cripple the camera? They've had the electronics for 15 years, why not jsut carry them over?

In light of this dare I say that the M6ttl was the most advanced mechanical M body Leica ever made? If the M6ttl had the framelines from an M2/M4 or the new MP3 it would be unbeatable.
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+1 for the M6ttl. if it had the framelines of the M2 and, being picky here, the older shutter wheel and knob rewind, i'd be on one. perfect for me as an indoor, lowlight, flash-enabled leica.
 
The big problem with AA batteries is they get hot and then quickly die. D batteries have 8 times the capacity yet only cost about twice as much. They don't heat up as readily. Pick up a battery tray to hold 4 D cells at an electronics store and buy one of those cute overpriced belt pouches at the camera shop that'll hold it. Solder about three feet of ordinary lamp cord to the battery tray. Cut a notch in the sliding door of your Vivitar flash big enough for the lamp cord.

Now the hard part. Make two dummy AA cells out of wood. They don't have to be neat, only the right size. Use a small wood screw in the end of each piece and attach the wires to the screws. Put the dummy cells in the battery holder and make sure the polarity is correct, insert the battery holder in your flash with the cord coming out through the notch. Put fresh name brand D cells in the battery tray. Right off the bat you'll get unbelievably fast recycle times.

If you want to travel light and don't think you'll be shooting a lot of flash pictures you can still use your flash with standard AA cells.
 
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If the M6ttl had the framelines from an M2/M4 or the new MP3 it would be unbeatable.
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That's the camera in my avatar. DAG did the VF update and removed the 135/28/75 framelines. I called it my M2TTL. :D Incidentally, I sold it here a couple of years ago for $1,000 even, as it had a bit of wear on the body.

I have to disagree about the Vivitar flash on an M body. Why not mount a toaster oven in the hotshoe while you're at it, it's only slightly smaller. ;)
 
That's a great idea, Al.

My beef with the SF20 is that it uses the expensive CR2(?) batteries, which are also not available everywhere.....
 
kevin m said:
That's the camera in my avatar. DAG did the VF update and removed the 135/28/75 framelines. I called it my M2TTL. :D Incidentally, I sold it here a couple of years ago for $1,000 even, as it had a bit of wear on the body.

I have to disagree about the Vivitar flash on an M body. Why not mount a toaster oven in the hotshoe while you're at it, it's only slightly smaller. ;)
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Actually the problem is not only the amount of framelines shown, but also the area of coverage that they indicate. You can disable the 28/75/135 markings, but they will still indicate a smaller area of coverage than the markings in the M2/M4/M5/M4-2/some M4-P. The old markings showed coverage at about 1 meter. Starting with the M6 they indicate coverage at .7 meters (the new close focus distance of Leica glass of that period). Unfortunately the new markings are therefore off by quite a bit at medium distances and infinity.

I had a looong talk about this with Don and basically you are screwed if you want a metered body with the old sized markings (aside from the M5). The only camera with a meter and apparently the old size markings (1 meter) is the MP3, but it costs an arm and a leg.
 
Yes, I always found my M6TTL with SF 20 is overexposure if set at normal output. So, if during the night portrait shooting, should I also set at 1.5 or 2 stops down?
 
I never put the 283 in the shoe. I hold the camera in my right hand, the flash in my left. That way I can keep the flash directly above the lens when shooting vertical shots.
 
goodies

goodies

Rik and others,

I took a look at your goodies :) SFILL looks interesting.

A question "off subject". About the strap. Is it OK to hang a Leica on only
one side ? I was told once that the eyelets are not "designed" to take the weight alone ?
 
sirius said:
It think it is rather strange to answer someone's question about how to use flash with Leica by saying buy faster lenses and don't use flash at all?! There seems to be a prejudice against flash around here, but it's more the improper/unskilled use of flash people rebel against, I think. A well skilled use of flash can make beautiful images while still taking advantage of what a rangefinder cameras offer. Many of the masters of Leica cameras could wield a deft flash, Winogrand, Gilden and Mark Cohen come to mind.

Many National Geographic photographers using a Leica M-system, like David Alan Harvey and William Albert Allard, used flash quite a bit and with a beautiful and natural effect. The slow slide films they used demanded augmented light even with the fastest lenses. Of course, they didn't use the Leica flash. It is not a very useful flash. There are many better ones (I like Metz). I suggest you do some more research about flashes and how you want to use it.
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Thanks, Sirius! My thoughts exactly. There's nothing inherently wrong or illegal in using flash with a Leica. Even the M3 has flash terminals! Besides, the proof of good use of flash in photography is that there is no evidence of flash use in the finished photo. At least, that's what I believe.

Henk, use the SF20 in A, as many others have said. The only problem you'll find is, as Kevin mentioned, that it works very well for indoor flash, but not for fill outdoors because the sync shutterspeed is too slow. However, even with a non-TTL camera like yours there must be ways. I am guessing that, in a juncture like this, the best you can do is close down the lens, use 1/50 as shutterspeed, and lower the flash output by two stops. Of course, you'll have to come to the best technique by trial and error... Good luck! :)
 
I never used it on my Leicas. If you want to take full advantage of fill flash, buy a Rolleiflex with the famous compur shutter (there is one type summicron with that shutter build in to be able to use fill flash, but its price is astronomic high)!
 
Thanks for the positive comments.

Thanks for the positive comments.

I used a Metz 32 CT4 with my M6 as well as the 1600A and found that both of these, but especially the Metz worked well. The Metz swivels side to side as well as up and down to create the off-axis effect by bouncing the light. I would probably have continued to use that flash if it were safe to use on the M8 but it apparently is not.

As for the Sunpak 1600A, the old fuji clear film containers cut in half can be taped nicely to the front of the 1600A for a diffuser. Probably not as diffuse as what Leicagoodies offers but very portable :)

I also love the work of two geographic photographers mentioned in his thread and have always especially enjoyed the Ernst Haas like movement that William Alard captures.

david
 
memphis said:
when I got my sf-20, there was no diffuser - had a bear of a time and still have not found one -- if anybody has an extra, I'd be happy to take it off their hands....
Click to expand...

I wrote here before about my solution for situations where you don't have a bounce flash or a "factory" diffuser... Cut a piece of a white plastic milk container the height of the flash tube and somewhat longer than the tube. Fasten the ends to the side of the flash with removable tape, velcro, or "Fun Tak" which is a removable, reusable putty. The plastic will bow out- not lay flat over the tube- which is good. It won't get hot and it'll allow a very tiny amount of direct flash to leak out toward the subject. You will, of course, lose about 1 or 1 1/2 stops of light using the diffuser, which, since we're talking about powering down a flash for the purpose of daylight fill, is not a bad thing.
 
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