Film Adapters on digital cameras

fredjclaus

Has anyone heard this before?

I have a Nikon D60 digital, and a Nikon SB-16 flash. The flash has the same contacts as the hot shoe on the camera so it works fine for what I do right now. I was in my local camera shop this morning looking to get a sync cable to go from the flash to an adapter I have on my hot shoe that gives me the PC sync port the D60 does not have. Two things happened in the shop that I was a bit confused about.

1. The sales rep told me even though the contacts are the same, the SB-16 is a film flash and really does not work well as a dedicated flash.

2. The rep told me that the adapter I have on the hotshoe since it only has 1 contact it's not built for digital cameras and can cause my flash to send electrical impulses and fry the camera.

Instead of a 12.00 sync cable the sales rep tried selling me a $40.00 off camera shoe sync for the flash. This would mean I would need to also buy a wireless trigger for when I mount the flash on a light stand for umbrella portrait work. So I went in to buy a 12.00 cable, and if I made the purchase, I would have walked out of there with $400.00 with of merchandise.

Now, I don't mind buying the products he mentioned as I plan on going wireless soon anyway. I just want to make sure that is what I need or maybe I have to look for a new camera shop to do business with.

What are your thoughts?

ziggy53

According to the following page the Nikon SB-16 is OK to use on a modern digital camera:

http://www.botzilla.com/photo/strobeVolts.html

PC connector will not give any flash dedication, only basic flash pulse.

If you could tell us more about what it is that you want to do, we could offer more suggestions.

fredjclaus

Thanks everyone, the only thing I really want to accomplish is to be able to use the flash off camera or on. I was a bit concerned that the salesman said it was not compatible but now that you pointed those things out I'm not too worried. The cable that I was looking to buy from them was strictly so I could move the flash over to my StroboFrame bracked but still connect the flash to my camera.

After my next post was answered, I'm looking into a wireless kit, so I will be selling this adapter they told me would fry my camera anyway.

As for the TTL functioning, I haven't gotten the hang of that yet, but I'm working on it.

dmeiselman

only way you could fry your hot shoe is if you use the adapter with a high wattage studio flash system. Because there is no fuse or voltage regulator in the AS-15, you can theoretically kill your camera. Apparently, canons are more prone to this kind of failure than nikon cameras.

This is highly unlikely with a standard hot shoe flash's pc sync port.

fredjclaus

this is what I was thinking as well. He used the theory that the fact that it had only one contact verses the Nikon 5 contact plugs, I would fry my camera. But the adapter he wanted to sell me that had a built in cable with another hotshoe for the flash (the 40.00 cable) had just one universal contact as well. I kinda figured he was blowing smoke to get me to buy a more expensive product. Little does he know, he not only turned me away from purchasing the 12.00 cable I originally wanted, but he also turned me away from his store completely. I've found better prices from companies such as Adorama, and other NYC companies. I'll look at them more often from now on.