Posts Tagged ‘Speed lights’

Using off-camera flashguns (often called speedlights or speedlites) can get you some great dynamic lighting that would be difficult to create any other way.

Presenting: Abby! by ryantron. on flickr (licensed CC-BY-ND)

There are a number of different ways that you can get your camera to trigger the flashes when you press the shutter. Some are basic and cheap, while others are more advanced and expensive. Let's look at the different options, their benefits and disadvantages:

TTL stands for Through The Lens, and refers to the camera metering the exposure through the lens, rather than using an external light meter. The exposure meter reading is used by the camera when determining the aperture and/or shutter speed in any auto exposure mode.

Virtually all cameras made today use TTL metering. A TTL flash means that the output of the flash can be set automatically by the camera, based on the camera's TTL metering system.

TTL mode on flash speed light