Nikon SB-910 Speedlight Unit

Product Information

Speedlight is the brand name used by Nikon Corporation for their photographic flash units, used since the company's introduction of strobe flashes in the 1960s. Nikon's standalone Speedlights (those not built into the company's cameras) have the SB- prefix as part of their model designation. Current Speedlights and other Nikon accessories make up part of Nikon's Creative Lighting System (CLS), which includes the Advanced Wireless Lighting, that enables various Nikon cameras to control multiple Nikon flash units in up to three separate controlled groups by sending encoded pre-flash signals to slave units. These are the number of full-power dumps Nikon claims you can get if you wait as long as 30 seconds for it to recycle. In actual automatic use, you'll get thousands of flashes depending on your distance, since less power is used for each pop. After some preliminary use, I don't think there's any doubt: get an SB-900 if you're heavy into flash (and retire your SB-800 to dedicated remote wireless use). Things that are new or changed over the SB-800:

The Nikon SB-600 is a flash made by Nikon for their digital and film single-lens reflex cameras. The SB-600 can mount to any Nikon camera with a four-prong hotshoe. The SB-600 cannot control other flashes through a wireless connection; however, a flash commander can control it wirelessly. The SB-600 is part of Nikon's Creative Lighting System (CLS) and features the intelligent-TTL (i-TTL) exposure mode. This model is the most compatible unit with older model film and earlier digital cameras like Nikon, F5, F6, and D100 as well as all recent cameras. Unfortunately, you'll need to learn that last bit if you really want to use one of the more interesting aspects of the flash, the head head style (CW, STD, or EVEN, which stands for a tightly focused beam, a slightly focused beam, or an evenly distributed beam, respectively). Since the second button is only rarely used (for Times in repeating flash, for example), I would have been tempted to place the flash head style into that button when the button isn't being used, as it isn't for TTL shooting. Flash head style is something I want to play with a lot, but if the flash is in standby, for instance, I have to push one button, hold a second one, press that button again, use the control wheel, then press the button one last time to make a change. That's just a bit too much UI for what could have just been a slider switch.The Nikon SB-500 is a lightweight and very compact shoe-mount flash unit with coverage for a 24mm lens on an FX camera or a 16mm lens on DX camera and combined with 100 lux LED for video light, powered by only two AA-size batteries. SB-500 is a very capable flash with a variable angle 'bounce' head (up to 90°) and rotates 180° for soft lighting effects. The flash is part of Nikon's Creative Lighting System (CLS) with two-group/two-channel control and features the intelligent-TTL (i-TTL) exposure mode. [1] SB-600 (discontinued) [ edit ]

On the other hand, one performance aspect is clearly improved and its a doozey: flash recycling is rated as 50-90% faster than before. I actually tried this with some nearly dead batteries--which usually represent the worst case for recycling--and was surprised to still see a major difference between my SB-800 and SB-900. With newly charged Nimh recyclable batteries, the stated claim of 2.3 seconds was nearly met in my testing, and I was getting almost exactly a 100% speed boost when I moved those batteries from the SB-800 to the SB-900. That's with four batteries. Essentially, the SB-900 recycles with four batteries about as fast as the SB-800 does with five. Nice. No more battery wart on the side of my flash!Announced with the D700, the SB-900 didn't get as much mention or notice as the new camera, but as far as I'm concerned, it's the more significant announcement. No, I'm not dissing the D700, which is a fine camera, but the D700 doesn't break new ground while the SB-900 does. Introduced November 2011, the SB-910 is Nikon's top professional flash. It is the biggest, fastest, brightest and most feature-laden flash they make. The SB-910 is an update to the short-lived SB-900, and adds hard plastic color-correction filters to replace the wimpy gels of the SB-900. Cameras – LCD screen is heavily worn either by de-lamination or has scratches to it. Rubber grips are starting to come away from the body. By many professionals, it is considered the most advanced flash unit when compared to its compact size. The Speedlights.net says that "for many professional photographers this flash is still the best hot shoe strobe out there today" with smaller size than the successor SB 900, but has bigger Guide Number 38 over 34. [5]

In all practicality, the SB-910 runs a long time and recycles immediately as it's actually used in its automatic modes. Almost no one buys SB-910s to run at full-power in manual mode all the time, but I still feel scammed. In terms of Guide Numbers, things haven't changed a lot. For FX cameras, the GNs tend to be very slightly lower for the SB-900 than for the SB-800 for equivalent settings, though the ability to focus the flash head and the 200mm head position can give you a boost if you're not trying to light really wide areas and prefer to limit the flash coverage. Also, there's a bit more power at the very widest setting, probably due to changes in the diffuser. From a practical, functional level, I'd rate this all as a wash. The ability to shape the beam is actually more beneficial in actual shooting than a bit more power would be, in my opinion. Bottom line: don't expect a light level boost over an SB-800. When I need more than one flash for serious lighting, I don't bother with these battery-powered things and use real studio strobes, which cost less and work so much better. Lenses – The lens has dust inside that may affect images. The rubber zoom/focus ring is coming away from the barrel of the lens.The zoom automatically adjusts to your lens, and smarter than earlier flashes, also adjusts for FX or DX. This professional SB-910 is aimed at full-time sports and news shooters who need as much power as fast as possible, and are bouncing it, using diffusers, and shooting at much longer distances than the rest of us shoot our family photos. Personally, I prefer the tiny Nikon SB-400 since I want a small flash for use as fill-flash, and velcro my own gels over the flash as needed. Distance-priority manual flash: you tell the SB-910 the distance (it reads ISO and aperture from your camera), and it calculates and sets the manual power level to use before you shoot. The button controls have changed from previous Nikon designs, and ironically, instead of a traditional Nikon direction pad we now have a Canon-style control wheel. But you won't care, the new design is much, much better than before.

The SB-900 is part of Nikon's Creative Lighting System (CLS) and features the intelligent-TTL (i-TTL) exposure mode. With compatible SLR cameras (such as the D40, D40x, D50, D60, D70, D70s, D80, D5000, D90, D200, D300, D700, D7000, D2h, D2hs, D2x, D2xs, D3, D3x and F6) can be used as master commander as well as remote flash unit within a CLS wireless lighting setup. No D-TTL. Users of older Nikon DSLRs will find that the SB-900 is only an i-TTL flash and won't correctly work on their bodies. I use my discontinued SB-600 in the very, very few occasions I need more power, or if I'm shooting a 35mm camera or any vintage. As of 2016, the SB-700 is its replacement, and the best flash if you need a big, powerful flash Speedlight" redirects here. For the similarly named Canon and Ricoh brands, see Speedlite (disambiguation).

Non-TTL "Auto aperture" Auto mode: the SB-910 is smart enough to read the ISO and set aperture from your camera, and then uses its own sensor to set the exposure. The SB-800 is part of Nikon's Creative Lighting System (CLS) and features the intelligent-TTL (i-TTL) exposure mode. It is compatible with all SLR cameras (such as the D2H, D2X, D3, D40, D50, D60, D70, D80, D90, D200, D300/s and F6), it can be used as master commander as well as remote flash unit within a CLS wireless lighting setup. It is one of the high-end units for Nikon which features metal joints and supports inside the body. It is sturdier than newer models like SB-700, SB-900, and SB-910 which are prone to impact breakage due to non-reinforced plastic shoe mount bases. All SB-800 units are made in Japan. More light flexibility. You can zoom further (to 200mm), the flash correctly sets to the FX or DX angle of view, gels used in the flash will be corrected for in white balance by the latest cameras, but most importantly you can change the "shape" of the light from highly concentrated to evenly distributed (with a setting in between). This is actually the "big" thing. You have to shoot with the different settings to understand just how much we've needed more light modification from flash. Now that we have it, we'll want more.