Shooting at the sun w/SB-900

Been super busy, so will keep this a bit short. In the previous post, you can see I took the kids out to the park. It was a beautiful day. I've read some issues about the SB-900, or, really more about the Nikon Advance Wireless Lighting (AWL) which can use the pop up flash in my D700 as the commander to trigger the SB-900 off camera.

Two issues I've seen.

One is the line of sight for the flash. Since it is not based on radio frequency, the light signal from the pop up flash will not bend or go through walls to reach the SB-900.

The other is too much light. This is the case I may have ran into. I did not set out to test either of the above. And, if you want more technical info, there are plenty out there. Just sharing my personal experience here.

In the photo below, you can see I was shooting into the sun. It was a bright day as well. The SB-900 was camera right, under direct sun light, as well as my D700. I took a few and the SB-900 would not trigger.


I move the SB-900 to camera left. Be sure to rotate the flash head 180 degree so the AWL sensor is now facing the D700 on the right now. With the SB-900 on the left side of the camera, now it is in the shade and triggered without any issues.


The SB-900 is still a great flash to have around. I have no regrets at all in getting it, even though it cost more than all the equipment you see here:


But none of the equipment above is going to let me shoot iTTL and high speed sync like the 2nd photo above, which was shot at 1/8000s!