Cable Terminology

CMoore

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I do not know the right words to use to find a cable and hot-shoe adapter. I would like to run a cable (3-5 feet) from the PC jack on the front of a camera to a hand-held flash unit that is made to sit atop the camera.
This would be for your "typical" Nikon or Canon
Canon A-1 and AE-1P
Nikon F2 and F3
What Terminology/Cable do I search for.?
Thank You
 

Kirks518

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If you're shopping/searching at one of the major retialers (Adorama/B+H/etc), I find the easiest search term to be "PC Sync" then just scroll until you see the one you need. There will be different ends shown, but the one that plugs into the camera is a 'PC Male', then you find the other end that your flash unit takes. Could be another male, could be a 'household', could be famle, could be a 3.5mm, or could be proprietary like the Vivitar, or something else.

Here's for B+H - http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/buy/Sync-Cords/ci/1214/N/4062040353?origSearch=pc sync
 
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CMoore

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jpentecost

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CMoore

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Your link was for Levi Jeans.......so you took a hot-shoe, installed it on the camera, soldered wires to that, and then ran those wires to another hot-shoe that the flash sits on.?
 

John Koehrer

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Yes, the PC-hotshoe's the one.
Keep in mind the automatic function only in the direction it's pointed.
 

RobC

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I thought these days wireless was the name of the game. People use pocketwizards or similar without wires for ease of triggering off camera flash.

If your speedlites have slave units in them you can use a very small low power flash on camera (good for catchlight in eyes) to fire the speedlight without wires.
 

RobC

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can't see whatever that link points to. I think you may have it referencing your cart cookie.

Whats on top of camera is called a "hot shoe". And into that you fit a flash or other unit. The hot shoe is female. What you put into it is male.
 
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CMoore

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I am talking about the PC Jack on the front of the camera.....is that a Female Connection.?
It looks just like the jack on the hot shoes I linked to (that you cannot see). In which case I would need a Male/Male PC Cable.
Thanks
 

M Carter

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Yes, the camera jack is female.

Some strobes have PC connectors, and those will be female as well. Some (like the Vivitar 285) have a specific connector which requires a special cable.

Many modern strobes don't have a connector at all and require a hot shoe adapter.

Keep in mind (far as I know anyway) that many dedicated strobe units (say, Nikon brand strobe used on a Nikon brand camera) can only do TTL flash with a special cable.

I'm not an on-camera flash guy so I don't know which strobes can do TTL via radio trigger - I think there are special, more pricey radio triggers made for TTL.

You can get a workable radio trigger for under thirty bucks (amazon, Cowboy Studio, etc). They won't have a lot of bells and whistles but they do the job - also, I find they won't work with my Mamyia RB but do work with all my 35's and my 4x5.
 
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CMoore

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OH .....OK.
This is all new to me. So the flash unit Does Not see the camera the same way.....hot-shoe compared to using the PC Jack.
Interesting
 

MattKing

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CMoore said:
OH .....OK.
This is all new to me. So the flash unit Does Not see the camera the same way.....hot-shoe compared to using the PC Jack.
Interesting
Click to expand...

Not quite.

Some hot shoes have additional contacts, and allow the exchange of additional information between the flash and the camera. This additional functionality has become more and more common as additional automation has become common on cameras. In the case of the Canon A-1 or AE1-P that you referenced at the beginning of your thread, those cameras did offer additional functionality when used with certain Canon or Canon compatible flashes either installed on the camera hot shoe or connected via a proprietary cable.

However, the basic synchronization of the camera shutter and the flash is accomplished essentially in the same way, whether you use a PC contact or a (simple) hot shoe.

Not surprisingly, the connection at the camera end will depend on what the camera offers by way of a connection, and the connection at the flash end will depend on what the flash offers by way of a connection.

The suggestion to use inexpensive radio triggers is probably a good one. I'm not sure why M Carter has trouble with his RB's because my older IR triggers work fine with mine.

Another good option can be having a low powered flash on the camera, and optical slave triggers on your off camera flashes. This only works, however, if you are working where others are not using flashes.
 

M Carter

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There seems to be quite a market for TTL cables and even TTL wireless nowadays though. Make sure you get the one for your brand!

MattKing said:
The suggestion to use inexpensive radio triggers is probably a good one. I'm not sure why M Carter has trouble with his RB's because my older IR triggers work fine with mine.
Click to expand...

I don't know myself - I get the occasional pop, but nothing faster than 1/30 or so. My great big old-school Quantum Radio Slave works just fine though (glad I kept the damn thing!)

The cheapie Amazon special works with everything I've thrown it on, old Minolta Spotmeter F, old 35's, my 4x5…though they need a pretty clear line of sight. There may be more resistance in the big-boy RB lenses… just glad I can trigger those with something. Sometime I'll try them with a Pocket Wizard, not in a hurry to dump a couple hundred on another trigger (that Quantum was about $500 back in the day…)

MattKing said:
Another good option can be having a low powered flash on the camera, and optical slave triggers on your off camera flashes. This only works, however, if you are working where others are not using flashes.
Click to expand...

I've seen people do that when their wireless fails. I've see people tape a Wein Peanut to the on-camera flash when it was messing with their lighting setup even. But that's a rough thing to get to work, I imagine, unless some fill from dead-front works for the shot.

When you get deeper into this, you'll find you carry a bunch of extensions and peanuts though!
 

MattKing

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M Carter said:
When you get deeper into this, you'll find you carry a bunch of extensions and peanuts though!
Click to expand...

And the handiest accessory of them all:

 

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