Flashing from a long distance: Radio Popper

Canon users have long had the advantage of being able to control and trigger their flashes over greater distances - including TTL measurement. For Nikon, when using iTTL, all this time there was only Nikon's own option to be able to control other system flashes with an SU-800 or a master flash (built-in flash, SB-800 or SB-900). But now there is movement in the market.

iTTL offers the possibility of letting the camera intelligence control the amount of light for the flashes. This is a real relief, especially when the lighting conditions change frequently. Since I often and enjoy working on location and "available light" for me means "light that is available", I have been waiting for a solution that allows me to work faster and more conveniently for a long time. And I have already tried out a lot: master control with the SB-900 or SU-800, also in conjunction with an SC-28, or triggering the flashes using radio remote triggers from various third-party manufacturers, which then do not support iTTL. I always have three options in my camera bag for triggering a remote flash - firstly for reliability and secondly because every system has advantages and disadvantages.

So far, the best solutions for remote flash control have always been Pocket Wizard called. Small additional devices that can send the iTTL signal over many meters and thus enable independent work. However, the Pocket Wizard is not yet available for Nikon. I have been in contact with the German distributor Profoto and they are waiting every week for the Pocket Wizards to finally be available for Nikon. Joe McNally currently has a prototype and occasionally reports on his blog that they are working better and better - whatever that means...

Since the end of July 2010, there is now also an alternative option for Europeans and thus the first system that enables iTTL flashing over many meters for Nikon in Europe: radio popper! Radiopoppers have been available for the American market for a long time and have found their market there alongside the Pocket Wizards.

Since I'm probably the first person in Germany to have these things and blog about them (at least Google didn't give me anything current), I'll write a little more detail here about how they work and what you can expect from them. You can currently only buy the accessories in the USA. More about my experiences with purchasing, processing and customs later.

Functionality: There are transmitters and receivers in the radio poppers, which only differ in terms of the way the antenna is attached. The transmitter has a rigid antenna, the receiver a flexible one. The transmitter is simply placed on the integrated flash (if you have one), an SU-800 or system flash and connected with the Velcro provided. The receiver has an "eye" that is placed on the eye (i.e. the infrared receiver) of the system flash. This works excellently with the included stands, which can be variably assembled for the different flashes and can be easily screwed onto a lamp stand. It is just as easy to place the receivers on the flash using the Velcro provided.
The receiver now records the signal from the master, converts it, sends it to the receiver, which converts it back and sends it as an infrared signal into the eye of the system flash. Sounds complicated, works wonderfully!

Commissioning: The radio poppers only have two buttons. These can be used to control a simple menu. In this menu, a channel can be selected in case several people trigger their flashes with radio poppers during a workshop and there are no "external flashes". There is also a menu item for controlling rapid flash sequences. I cannot test this at the moment because my D3 is still being repaired - but I will catch up. The most important menu item, however, is the supported system. All radio poppers are set to Canon in the basic configuration and must be switched to Nikon in the menu. This is the only thing that may be a little confusing, because it says in big letters on the packaging that these are the radio poppers for Nikon. The friendly support at Radiopopper pointed out to me that "for Nikon" only means that the receivers are supplied with a mounting stand for Nikon.

So for commissioning, the transmitter and receiver must be converted to Nikon. This takes about 10 seconds. However, the two AAA batteries supplied must be inserted first. This takes maybe 5 seconds. The radio poppers are then functional.

Test with short exposure times (Nikon-speak: “FP short time”): The problem with the SU-800 or with master control via other flash units is that the infrared eye of the slave flash has to see the master flash. This works quite well with a master flash over a few meters, but with an SU-800 in sunshine it is almost impossible. And I've already seen Joe McNally, how he tried to outwit the system's problems in a closed room - the problems only get worse in sunlight. The big advantage within the Nikon system (CLS) is that it is the only way to trigger flashes with shutter speeds shorter than 1/250s. This is often necessary, especially when the sun is shining. This is where the circle closes: Sun – I need iTTL – so I use an SU-800 – but the SU-800 rarely works in the sun. Now you know why I want an iTTL-capable remote shutter release. (Alternatively, I would like the option here Using an ND filter throw in the room to enable longer exposure times than 1/250 second.)

In a first test, I therefore equipped a D200 with an SU-800 in the shade near the ground and tried to fire two flashes. One flash is to the left of the camera and brings a basic brightness to the foreground. One flash is to the right of the camera behind the tree and brings a fill-in light to the face. Neither flash fires when using an SU-800, even in the shade. The flash to the left of the camera is only a good meter away. But it is about a meter higher than the camera and that makes "communication" between the SU-800 and the flash impossible. But I need the TTL mode on the flashes because the exposure time is shorter than 100/1 second even at ISO250.

Now the radio poppers come into play. One transmitter and two receivers switched on, camera triggered, flashes are automatically triggered. Picture finished! No matter what the exposure time. I've tried several. Even 1/8000s is no problem. But the picture looks stupid because the surroundings are black - that's why you see a picture with 1/320s as the exposure time.

And with the radio poppers, the lightning flashes even when the sun is shining. Below is a picture in the sunshine – she is peeking bashfully over my right (left) shoulder. Since I photographed here with an exposure time of 1/8000 second, there isn't that much of the sunlight left.

Test distance without visual contact: In a further test, I placed the two flashes behind the dense rows of trees so that there was no visual contact between the camera or transmitter and the two flashes on the right and left behind the rows of trees. I equipped the D200 with my 200/2 and kept going back and taking photos again and again. At some point the lightning on the right no longer fired reliably. I then moved forward a few meters again and got to the point that ensures that the flashes are triggered reliably. That was at 70m between camera and object. At this point I'm still wondering why the flash that was closer to the camera didn't fire at first. I gave away a few meters here – more on that in the next test.

Test distance with visual contact: Now I positioned the flashes so that there is direct visual contact between the transmitter and receiver - you can see the locations of the flashes in the picture below. I equipped the D200 with 200/2 plus a 2x converter and went further and further back. Thanks to the crop factor of the D200, the focal length corresponds to 600mm and I was able to go relatively far back and still see something of my loved one, who kindly made herself available for my test series. At some point the right flash stopped firing, but the left one did. Since both flashes were the same distance, I was suspicious this time. Thanks to the telephone connection to my loved one, she was able to find out that the antenna on the left flash was pointing upwards, but the antenna on the right was pointing downwards. After the antenna was pointed upwards, I was able to walk back a few meters - until the park was over.

That was pretty much exactly the position at which the right flash no longer flashed reliably. This time it was because the antenna was behind the flash - and in the left flash it was in front of the flash. In the picture below you can clearly see why this is the case - and how it could be fixed.

So it can be assumed that I have pretty much exhausted the range of the Radiopopper system. I was 150m away when I took the picture! And if in doubt, retouching the flashes is no problem 🙂

Oh yes: when I was far away I noticed that the iTTL functionality doesn't work in this lighting situation. Due to the large dark area in the image, the camera hopelessly overexposed the flashes. Even turning the flashes down to -3EV didn't produce the desired result. So I switched the flashes to manual mode at 150m away and controlled the flash output manually. Everything on the SU-800 is convenient without having to touch the flashes.

Price: Like you in Radio Popper Shop As you can see, each piece costs $249. There is also packaging and shipping of $37,95 per shipment. For me, shipping actually only took 2 days before my package was in Germany. But it was first in customs and so I had to wait 8 days from the time of purchase until I could receive the radio popper. However, the postman wanted me to pay the customs fees and I didn't have the change at home. So wait another day because the postman was nice enough to come by again the following day. Since the dollar exchange rate always fluctuates slightly, you can expect around €700 for a set with a transmitter and two receivers - including all fees.

Ultimately, it's a wonderful and reliable way to trigger and control lightning, even from a great distance. I am completely satisfied with my purchase of the radio poppers. But given the price, that should really be the case.