YN565EX Cross References

Here are cross references to previous posts on LightDescription about the YN565EX flash:

Introduction to the YN565EX
External power
YN565EX with the Canon G12 
YN565EX with the Canon 7D

Posts on LightDescription about the older, simpler YN460EX flash:

Introduction to the YN460-II
YN460-II with the Canon 7D

Additional articles and information on the YN565EX:

ThePhotoGadget
Speedlights Review
An ongoing discussion on POTN forum

I continue to use and like both the YN460EX-II and the YN565EX. 

YN565EX and the 7D

My YN565EX performs as expected on and with my Canon 7D. The YN565EX does not have high speed sync and cannot function as the master flash for the Canon wireless system but the lack of those two features was expected. Otherwise, the YN565EX seems to work well with the 7D. In fact, the easiest way to describe the YN565EX is that it is almost a Canon 580EX II.

While playing around with the YN565EX and Canon 580EX II, I realized that the YN565EX is perceptibly louder and sounds a bit “harder” as well when it flashes. The sound and volume is not particularly objectionable but is definitely noticeable when the two flashes are activated side-by-side. On the positive side, I found that the YN565EX recycles a bit faster than the 580EX II. With one flash in each hand, I manually triggered them at the same time and watched the ready lights. Both flashes were in manual mode and flashing at full power. The YN565EX ready light always lit first – even after swapping batteries. This may be nothing more than an indication that the YN565EX ready light comes on at a different point than does the 580EX II; even so, it is sort of reassuring.

To get the (first) photo of the 7D with mounted and flashing YN565EX, the camera was turned off and the flash was set to optical trigger (SL 1) at lowest power (1/128). The picture was taken with my G12 using its manual internal flash set to minimum power. A YN460-II, also in SL 1 mode, was placed outside my homemade light tent as the main light. The YN565EX (and YN460-II) work well in both SL 1 and SL 2 (ignores Canon pre-flash) modes.

On the 7D, the YN565EX works as expected. Again, there is no high speed sync and the YN565EX cannot be used as the master flash in Canon’s wireless system. The YN565EX zooms with the 7D lens (15-85mm Canon in this case) and indicates the true focal length (not the 35mm equivalent) on its display.

Off-camera, the YN565EX could be triggered wirelessly by the built-in flash of the 7D or by the 580EX II mounted on the 7D. Exposure compensation on the 7D was passed along to the YN565EX. Using the 580EX II mounted on the 7D as the “A” flash and designating the YN565EX as the “B” flash, the flash ratios could be set in the 7D system.

The YN565EX and RF-602 were used to make my most recent PAW (and many more that day) so this combination works well together (shame on Yongnuo if they did not!).

My intention is not to use the YN565EX mounted on the 7D but as a second flash with Canon’s wireless system or as a manual flash to be triggered by my Yongnuo RF-602 wireless triggers. The YN565EX seems to meet my requirements and expectations.

Next, the YN565EX and the Canon G12 …

Fireworks and Flash

.

It almost worked. I had imagined an outdoor self portrait with a huge burst of fireworks above my head and decided to try for it. I could do this in my back yard because several neighbors go all out with their own fireworks display every July 4th and New Year's eve. Last year, I got a nice fireworks picture by adding a little flash. This year I would use my 7D and two flashes off-camera. A 580EX II with Lumiquest Softbox III would be the main light. A Yongnuo YN460-II with Lumiquest snoot would be opposite the 580EX to provide separation from the background. The 580 EX II would be triggered by the on-camera flash of the 7D. The Yongnuo would be used in optical slave mode. Both the main and background flashes would be placed very close to me. The 7D would be triggered by a Yongnuo remote trigger, the RF-602. I'd stand over my mark and watch the sky behind me for a burst of brilliance. I'd then quickly turn around, smile and press the remote trigger. But what camera settings to use?

Checking DOFMaster, after a few trials, I decided to set the 7D for manual focus at the hyperfocal distance of the Canon 15-85mm zoom at 35mm focal length. With an aperture of f11, the hyperfocal distance at 35mm is 18.8 so everything from 9.4 feet to infinity should be in focus. I guessed that the 580EX II would have enough power at f11 even shooting through the Lumiquest softbox because it was close to me (it did). I set the flash ratio at 4:1 and let the Canon ETTL system control the flash. The Yongnuo 460-II was set at it lowest flash power setting.

The 7D would be shooting at f11 for depth of field. I choose manual exposure and dialed in a shutter speed of 1 second. The combination of flash at ~ 1/1000 second and shutter at 1 second might seem odd but the flash exposure was for me and the longer exposure was to catch the fireworks.

After setting up the equipment, to my aggravation, the 7D did not trigger the 580EX II. Finally I realized that with the 7D in portrait position the on-camera flash was on the left hand side and the zoom lens was blocking the triggering flash from the view of the 580EX II which was on the right hand side. I then moved the 580EX II from the camera right hand side of the scene to the left hand side and also moved the background/hair light from the left to the right. Suddenly everything worked as planned.

Unfortunately I missed most of the fireworks activity because of having to set up the gear twice. The introductory picture was the only one captured with any significant amount of fireworks in the sky. Wait 'til next year!
.

YN460-II with 7D

.

I'm still pleased with the simple and inexpensive YN460-II flash described previously. Sure, all it does is flash when told to do so and its flash power must be set manually; that is, no automatic flash exposure at all. But the YN460-II does these basic things well. Also noted previously, the YN460-II works with the Canon 7D camera even when the 7D popup flash is set for ETTL mode provided the YN460-II is set in its own "S2" mode. Again, "works" means only that the YN460-II fires with the appropriate timing -- its flash power is not set by the 7D flash controls.

After a few days of tinkering, I suddenly wondered "What if the YN460-II actually interfered with the 7D popup flash?" To test my loss of faith, I set up a simple scene with the faithful Woof-Woof and fired off several shots at varying conditions. First, the base case using only the 7D popup flash is shown below. The 7D was set for ISO 200 using manual exposure and 1/250 second at f5.6. The 7D was set to ETTL mode using the internal flash only and without flash compensation. Using the Canon 15-85mm lens at mid-zoom, I was perhaps nine feet away from Woof-Woof. The white balance was set for "flash" in Adobe Camera Raw.

.

I then tried the 7D with the YN460-II in several positions using bounce and direct flash at varying power levels. Not much to report here except that the 7D flash obviously does not know or care about the YN460-II. The 7D fires its preflash (which the YN460-II ignores), computes the "correct" flash exposure without regard to the YN460-II and then fires away -- joined this time by the YN460-II. In other words, the 7D flash does not instantaneously change its mind when the YN460-II fires.

To get the shot below, the YN460-II was placed a little behind Woof-Woof and aimed directly at him. The YN460-II was set to 1/32 power; the 7D internal flash was in ETTL mode and set at -3 flash compensation. White balance was set in ACR at the "flash" setting.

Throwing a simple second flash into the mix certainly can add a new dimension to a shot!
.

Yongnuo Speedlite YN460-II

.

In the end, I couldn’t resist ordering the YN460-II even though my arsenal of flashes is (mostly) built around the Nikon SB series. In a previous post, I wrote about replacing the foot of a damaged SB-24. I actually did not expect to win that damaged SB-24 and had, in fact, ordered the YN460-II just two days prior. Fifteen days later, the YN460-II arrived in a plain brown wrapper, shipped via airmail from Hong Kong.

The YN460-II is a simple and inexpensive flash unit that is an upgrade of the (what else) YN460. The upgrade consists of more power (claims Guide Number of 53 instead of 33), faster recycling and fine tuning for the flash power. The flash head has both tilt and swivel. The YN460-II has two operating modes: manual flash and optical slave flash. In either operating mode, the YN460-II flash power must be set manually.

Here are my first thoughts and impressions.

My first concern was the packaging. Although the shipping envelope was lightly padded, the YN460-II box was simply placed inside it without additional padding. There was no padding inside the box although the flash was inside a plastic bag which was inside a nice black cloth bag. In spite of my concerns, all parts arrived in good condition.

.

The YN460-II is a nice looking flash with a better quality appearance that I expected. The tilt/swivel head position is held by friction; that is, just grab it and turn/tilt – no release buttons to push. This is fine for now but I wonder if it will become sloppy loose with much use.

I dropped a set of PowerEx NiMh rechargeables into the YN460-II and pressed the ON button. Nothing. Press again – nothing again. Did I get a bad flash? A quick glance at the instructions confirmed that I was indeed pushing the ON/OFF button but should have been holding it down for 2 seconds. Duh. Firing a few quick pops manually, the YN460-II took about 8 seconds to recycle to full power; the SB-28 from which I robbed the batteries took about 9 seconds. (Time to recharge?) Recycling was near instantaneous at minimum power setting. (A fresh set of PowerEx reduced the recycle time to less than 5 seconds.)

.

Changing the flash power is easy and very visual: Press the Power +/- button and watch the lights change. However, the button must be pressed for each step change. Same for changing modes: Press the Mode button and watch the lights change. When the YN460-II is turned on, the mode is set to manual and the flash power is set to the minimum; it does not remember the previous settings.

In contrast to the simplicity of setting flash power, “fine-tuning” was not so simple. Well, I could follow the instructions but the flash power output level lights do not remain as set so I had no confidence in what I’d done. The procedure is to press and hold the MODE and PILOT buttons until the middle light blinks then use the +/- button to fine tune. This seems OK except that the output level lights soon revert to the non-fine tuned display. Pressing MODE and PILOT again shows the fine-tuned setting. I quickly resolved not to use the fine tuning feature (for now anyway). Illustrated is 1 stop down from maximum (i.e., would be half power) but then 2 clicks farther down using "fine tuning".

Somewhat skeptically checking the YN460-II in optical slave mode, I found that it works very well with my Canon G9. In fact, the YN460-II was triggered by the G9 flash in both the S1 and S2 settings when the G9 was in P mode. With the G9 in manual mode (no pre-flash emitted), the YN460-II was triggered only in its S1 mode. Even more surprising, these quick tests were shot at 1/500 second! I was impressed. With my 7D, the YN460-II also worked in both S1 and S2 modes when the 7D was set for ETTL; however, at 1/200 second and faster, S2 is necessary. In a dimly lit room, triggering is easily possible at a distance of some 20 feet. The obvious conclusion is to use S1 for pure manual flash and S2 for triggering with ETTL -- as advertised.

Next up was to test the YN460-II with my Cactus wireless triggers. The only way to connect to the YN460-II is through the hot shoe. This is OK with me because my Cactus units are more reliable when connected via the hot shoe. The YN460-II worked fine with my Cactus wireless triggers and could be triggered at 1/640 second using the Canon G9.

Finally, I compared the flash power of the YN460-II to some other flashes. I did this by shooting the flashes directly mounted on my Canon G9 camera in full manual mode. Just firing shots across a dimly lit room, it seems to me that the YN460-II is not as powerful as the Canon 580EX but is similar to the Nikon SB-28 and more powerful than the SB-24. In fact, the relative power of all those flashes seems to be about as listed in my post on guide numbers. I also noticed that the YN460-II seems a bit “cool” in color cast, especially in comparison to the Canon 580EX (which seems a bit warm).

All in all, my YN460-II works and seems to work as advertised. I’m pretty happy with this one – in fact, am thinking about getting another one.

.