Looking for a good small flash for the Olympus OM-1, and some questions

My sister is getting married in about a month and has tasked me with doing the photography at her wedding. Note that she and her fiance are both 100% okay with having very amateurish candid photography done (they wanted to do that thing where they just get disposables for everyone, but its too expensive), so I don't need anything fancy and am just going to go around taking snapshots and having fun and such. I am going to use the Olympus XA rangefinder and an Olympus OM-1 for backup, and so I can take b&w and color photos at the same time. The Olympus XA has a pretty good flash that attaches to the side, but I don't have a flash for the OM-1.

Can anyone make a recommendation for the flash? I really don't need anything that "good" or fancy, and I will probably almost never use it aside from this time. I also won't need anything that has crazy illumination power or anything -- it will mostly be portrait-style shots taken from a fairly close distance. I am also curious how to use the flash this way, since there is no meter. I understand lots of flashes have a chart that tells you what settings to use? If there is anything else that I should know, please let me know. Again, I want to note that finer points aren't that relevant here -- just aiming for getting interesting looking fun snapshots for them to remember the event. If the pictures aren't "way too dark" or "way too bright", then we're good.

Thank you!

Olympus T20 maybe?

Yes an older flash is your best bet. New flash doesn't have auto feature which would be a pain to use in your case. One important thing. Do you have the hot shoe for your OM-1? If not you will have to mount the flash on the side which is not small. In case you have to mount the flash on the side any of the Metz 45 series would work great and cheap ($50 or less) but it's not small

Chan Tran said:

Yes an older flash is your best bet. New flash doesn't have auto feature which would be a pain to use in your case. One important thing. Do you have the hot shoe for your OM-1? If not you will have to mount the flash on the side which is not small. In case you have to mount the flash on the side any of the Metz 45 series would work great and cheap ($50 or less) but it's not small

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I idiotically did not realize the OM-1 didn't have a hotshoe -_- any other solution will not work, because it will take up too much space. Basically my only other option is the Agat 18k with a flash, which...I am not too sure about lol. I might just have to risk it all with the Olympus XA. Mine hasn't let me down so far, so I'm not too worried, but ideally I'd have a backup. May be able to borrow one from a friend.

-persimmon-tree- said:

I idiotically did not realize the OM-1 didn't have a hotshoe -_- any other solution will not work, because it will take up too much space. Basically my only other option is the Agat 18k with a flash, which...I am not too sure about lol. I might just have to risk it all with the Olympus XA. Mine hasn't let me down so far, so I'm not too worried, but ideally I'd have a backup. May be able to borrow one from a friend.

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You can get the accessory shoe any version would work. I saw on Ebay selling for $20 or so. The higher versions are needed for the OM-2 which has TTL feature.

So get the hot shoe adapter and a vintage flash with the thyristor auto exposure control. My favorite is the Vivitar 283. I needed a spare accessory and bought a whole kit in perfect condition from eBay for $20 shipped.

My vote is also for Vivitar 283, they're cheap and abundant in used market. The only cons is probably relatively long recycle time but just make sure you use fresh alkaline and you're good to go.
Use the table on the flash and as long you shoot with the same distance you will only use the same aperture. Speed is at flash sync.

I used a Vivitar 283 for years with a hotshoe equipped OM1. The flash is comparatively quite big, but I was happy with the results.
FWIW, when the OM1 was current, it was sold with the accessory shoe (Fix-1) as part of the package.
Now, if I had an OM1 again, I would use it with either one of my T32 flashes- preferable - or one of my T20s - smaller and therefore potentially preferred. Than, if the desire to add to your OM collection grows and you acquire one of the TTl flash capable camera bodies - I still have 3 of them - you will be able to use TTl flash as well as on-flash automated exposure control.
The T32 is actually quite impressive when compared with the Vivitar - at least with on-camera flash, or if one has one of the accessory cables and one of the camera models that permit off camera TTl flash control.

You have enough lead time to get the hot shoe for the OM-1 hopefully, however you might also consider getting a folding flash bracket. Although it makes the camera larger, they aren't really particularly heavy and they move the flash a bit further off camera, which improves the quality of photos.

I recommend getting a flash that has 1. "A" type auto exposure where the flash cuts off the exposure when it senses enough light; and 2. a pivoting head that allows bouncing the flash off the ceiling or a light modifier for more diffused light. Examples include Vivitar 283, 285, some slightly smaller models like Vivitar 2800, Nikon SB-24, SB-25 etc (you can use these in auto mode with non-Nikons), and so on. Also consider getting a light modifier like a Lumiquest pocket bouncer for the use of partially diffused flash.

Read the "Strobist" blog for some ideas about lighting with non-TTL flash. Shoot a practice roll before the occasion. And bring a set of spare AA batteries. Have fun.

Just to confirm, yours is an OM-1 or OM1n? Different shoes available.

Anyway, also vounch for the T-20 (or even T-32). They are great flashes and had worked ok with both my OM1/OM1n and OM4.


Marcelo

A nice small unit which I have many of us the Vivitar 252. It is not a thyristor unit but battery technology has improved a lot since it came out and you can always use rechargeable NiMh AAs.

dynachrome said:

A nice small unit which I have many of us the Vivitar 252. It is not a thyristor unit but battery technology has improved a lot since it came out and you can always use rechargeable NiMh AAs.

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Have you used it with NiMH? Back in the old days I smoked a similar Vivitar unit for using NiCad in it.

If my memory is right on this point, I have used NiMh batteries with a 252. I am away on vacation or I would try it now.

One thing to watch out for when using vintage flashes is the discharge voltage. Many older flashes were designed before it was common for cameras to contain circuitry, and have a discharge as high as 80V or even 250+V. Let that dump into your camera's electronics and there's a good chance they'll fry first time. The safe zone as reported by most manufacturers is <6V; up to 24V may be OK (some people think the manufacturers are covering themselves by under-reporting the limit), but it's a risk. The OM-1 at least has a mechanical shutter, but as I understand it the metering system would be in danger.

BotZilla hosts an extremely helpful list of measured voltages here. If you do get a vintage flash, it's also worth spending £6 on a voltmeter and double-checking the discharge voltage yourself before you connect it to your camera.

I use (on 35mm film cameras) and would personally vouch for the quality of the following three flashes, all of which are modern and so (presumably!) have low discharge voltages -- at any rate they've never fried any cameras I've used them on.

Nissin i40 - the biggest of the three. Zoom from 24mm to 105mm. GN32 at 50mm zoom, IIRC. Good enough that Leica sell a rebranded version of it under their own name (the SF40). Head tilts up for bounce and also rotates laterally 360°. Built-in diffuser and flash card which you can pull out / retract at will. Manual mode has full coverage (in stops) from 1/1 down to 1/256 power. It has TTL, but not auto, so on an OM-1 you'd have to use it in manual.

LighPixLabs FlashQ Q20II - GN20. With the push of a button the flash can be dismounted from the part that attaches to the hot shoe, which becomes a wireless transmitter allowing you to use the flash off-camera. Head tilts up for bounce, and has a slot for easy insertion of colour gels (which come included). Manual mode has full coverage (in stops) from 1/1 down to 1/64 power. Manual only, no TTL or auto.

Nikon SB-30 - the oldest of the three (I think it was made about 20 years ago). GN16. This is a pretty sought-after flash, but you can sometimes get them on the bay for £60-70. It tilts down for macro photography but doesn't tilt up for bounce. In manual mode it offers 1/1, 1/8 and 1/32 power, less versatile than the other two flashes. But in another sense it's the most versatile of the three, because it has not only a TTL mode, but also four power-levels of old-style, OM-1 friendly auto flash, where the flash measures the light for you and shuts off when it judges the frame to be sufficiently illuminated. A minor negative: because the flash isn't centred over its foot, it looks slightly silly on the OM-1 (I've tried).