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Review on Canon ST E2 Speedlite Transmitter Speedlites by David Fields

Revainrating 4 out of 5

good for money buy cheap!

I used to want this little transmitter but never bought it as it was a little too expensive for the performance I was supposed to expect. Since this guy is now a small dinosaur, I was able to get hold of him at a very reasonable price and try him out with little risk. I'm happy to report that this transmitter works much better than I thought it would. At a recent wedding I was able to easily pilot a 580EX Speedlite in a Westcott Rapid Box Octa and took some very nice pictures of the cake, bride's shoes and ring. There was no need to jump off the camera to set the flash output and the TTL exposure was really excellent. I used to use a 580EX as a master to control a 550EX off-camera flash, but now I can use both flashes off-camera, as I did for my daughter's multi-flash indoor shots and my model's shots at home done outdoors in a dappled sun. While shooting outdoors was a little unfortunate, most of my exposures were still achieved when both flashes fired. I would still use Pocket Wizards for 100% hits, but the ease of TTL exposure makes it worth trying on my shoot first. If you already own a 430EX, 430EXll, 550EX, 580EX or 580EXll flash unit and want to try TTL off-camera on the cheap, I highly recommend getting one of these transmitters, assuming you can find a good one for find about $100 or less like me. As long as you have direct line of sight to the flash, the system will work fine. It's a lot easier indoors than outdoors, so be aware. The only complaint I have is that the hot shoe mount is pretty loose. I confirmed that this is quite normal, but it's not really reassuring. I've tried this on both of my guns; 5Dmkll and 1DmkiV.

Pros
  • handy item
Cons
  • so far so good