strobe and sync

ISO standard for strobe flashes

There us an ISO standard for strobe sync. It says that cameras should be able to accept voltages up to 24 volts. But lots of strobes have higher triggers than that.

Use a 400 volt SCR.

Love to see the standards.

The ISO 10330 specification ("Photography -- Synchronizers, ignition circuits and connectors for cameras and photoflash units -- Electrical characteristics and test methods," 1992) says that all ISO-compliant cameras should be able to accept trigger voltages up to 24V. Though a Canon engineer is the nominal head of the ISO workgroup, for some reason Canon continues to insist that their cameras tolerate no more than 6V (make that Canon USA — an email from Canon Canada says: "There is not a maximum voltage requirement for the hot shoe terminal on the PowerShot G1." Go fig!). For that reason I've tagged strobes that trigger at voltages between 6V and 24V as "your call." Depending upon who you ask — the camera or strobe manufacturers — those strobes are acceptable or they are not.

posted by Richard @ 6:44 PM