Living with the Canon EOS 7D – Part 2
It’s been a while since I have received the Canon EOS 7D, ad to tell you the truth I am rather happy and even sometimes very impressed with it, the ISO noise reduction is amazing but I’ll leave that for another day.
But as all things good and 95% of this camera is pure goodness itself but I encountered certain limitations that are from the unexpected to the absurd, all related to the use of flashes. I have to be honest too, the following is advanced stuff and I mean advanced, but not all of it.
First up, to me not advanced but rather required, is “rear curtain sync” using the built-in infrared remote remote on the camera, mind you we tried the same with a Canon Speedlite 580EX set as a commander too with the same results, well he is the news flash (sorry for the pun), it is not possible! Read the manual it will tell you so, absurd you say? I agree completely. Obviously, whether you use a Canon Speedlite 430EX or 580EX on the camera’s shoe, it will work 100%. I could not find a Canon Commander to test this with, so I cannot tell about that but I suspect the same issue will arise.
The second one is what is known as Multi or Strobe, this function allows the photographer to have multiple flash exposure on one exposure, the Canon EOS 7D does this with ease using it’s pop-up flash, unfortunately it is far from powerful enough. So I put it in remote to trigger the 3 Canon Speedlite 430EX and… The option in no longer available. Ok so maybe I ask a little too much, it is advanced stuff. I fit a Canon Speedlite 430EX to the camera shoe and the option is still not available. So the pop-up flash can do it but not the semi-professional flash… Confusion sets in… So, thanks to the guys at Cameratek, we put a Canon Speedlite 580EX on the camera shoe… Multi is now available! And it works, but here is the kicker, you are going to love this! Put the Canon Speedlite 580EX in Multi mode and make it a master, guess what! The Canon Speedlite 430EX receive the Multi order and execute it. So the Canon Speedlite 430EX is capable of it but it looks like the Canon EOS 7D’s infrared commander is not a “full” commander.
But do not mistake this for a rant, these are true limitations of the flashes, I still love my Canon Speedlite 430EX as well as my Canon EOS 7D and find very little wrong with it.
Now here is a word to Canon, DO NOT DO HALF A JOB!!! Nikon’s have no issues with this to my knowledge, so next firmware update include it in! Both please!
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