by Gavin Seim Updated 04/2010: Triggering flashes wirelessly is becoming a popular creative lighting tool. Popular flashes from Canon and Nikon often have built in wireless, but its basically working with old infrared technology making it essentially a line of sight tool with limited reliability.
To resolve this, various third part products have come to the market using RF (radio signal). Pocket Wizards have been a popular choice and their early units, though larger and only providing manual control, seem to have a good reputation. More recently we’ve seen products that offer not only manual, but full auto control. We’ll look at a few today.
UPDATE: 04/2010: Nearly a year has passed since this review first posted. I’ve been using Radio Poppers since then and they have worked amazingly well (note that I have no vested interest in either company). Pocket Wizards have released further firmware updates to their Flex series as well as other workarounds. While I have not purchased another set (and have no intention of doing so), I have seen little evidence that the Flex has been fixed other than tacky workarounds, like wrapping the flash in an RF shield to prevent interference, or holding the unit off camera tethered to a cord to make it work properly.
When a manufacturer has to resort to these sort of things, I consider the product a fail. If you look at even more recent comments you’ll see people are still having the same poor results. I found that Amazon reviews were mixed. There were various users getting the poor results that I experienced and it seems the positive reviews were mostly users satisfied with a short usable range, rather than what PW advertises. You can read them for yourself via the link.
Bottom Line: If you’re just going to use the Flex units very close in a studio, they “might” satisfy you. But if you plan on using them in the way their advertised and getting long range versatile wireless flash, don’t expect much. They did not perform. Nikon units of the Flex are supposed to be coming soon as of this writing, but I can’t say how well those will function. I have little confidence.
In contrast, Radio Popper PX units are great. RP’s work a bit differently. A base transmitter sits on top of your main flash (no they can’t work solo shoe mounted like the PW’s). A receiver unit is mounted to the front of your remote flash (the new bracket that came out last summer makes this much easier). The remote unit picks up the RF signal from the main unit, converts it back to an IR signal which it shot into the flash onto which it’s attached. All the built in wireless flash functions work like normal (even High Speed Sync) and can be controlled form the flash, because all that’s happening RP’s are forwarding the IR signals into a reliable RF signal and then back again on the other end.
While it may sound a bit more janky and clunky the main thing is they do what their advertised to and do it well. That’s what really matters to me. I have used Radio Poppers latest PX units outdoors at over 500ft apart with full functionality. That’s the kind of reliability I need. Radio Poppers also has both Canon and Nikon units available.
I consider the Flex series to be an Epic fail. While I know many Pocket Wizard products are known to be good (mainly their manual units) I have to say that I have little confidence in them as a company after releasing a product this poor. You can take a look thru the review below that I posted last year for some additional thoughts and information… Gavin
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So, on to my straight dope review. First I purchased PW’s new Flex Control TL series which have full TTL functionality and high speed sync (Canon only for now, but Nikon coming soon). Sadly I was disappointed with almost useless results (for me at least). Range was claimed to be hundreds of feet and actual tests would not even produce consistent results at even fifty feet.
Often they didn’t fire at all and other times gave full dumps instead of the set power. Some of these issues are said to be fixable in firmware (easily updatable by the way), but the core problem seems to be that PW shipped a product who’s operation is interfered with by the very flashes it’s said to work with. The folks at PW tech gave strings of reasons why their system was totally unreliable, and their solutions were things like, use the lower end 430EX flash instead of the 580, or use an off hot-shoe cord attaching the PW to the flash to help reduce interference.
You’d think it was Canon who was claiming their flashes were made to work with Pocket Wizards products. In reality PW shipped a product advertised to work with the Canon system and seemed to know full well it had major issues. Sorry, but for five hundred a pair, I expect these to work as advertised.
Next I tried Radio Poppers new PX series. Rather than attaching to the hot-shoe, these sit on the flash, pick up the IR signals, convert them to radio waves and send them back into the receiving end unit. Not quite as elegant, but the bottom line is they worked. You get all the functionality that the built in wireless in the flash offers, but with long range and reliability. I’ve been outdoors at around six hundred feet away with them working great and triggering my remote flash with full TTL. They also offer models for both Canon and Nikon flashes.
So the bottom line. I sent back my PW Flex series. At this point they seem to be an epic fail. I liked the physical design, features and the whole idea. The only problem is they didn’t work.
Final thoughts. For me Radio Poppers won hands down. I purchased them after the test and I’m really liking them. Yes there’s room for improvement and their mounting, being not a direct hot-shoe attachment, but attaching to the flash itself is a bit more Jerry rigged and requires a flash (or OEM transmitter) on camera, but the most important thing is that they work reliably.
I suggest you make your own informed decision based on the latest reviews and info. There’s a great bunch of great review videos from the folks over at Tri Coast. I’ll embed their summery below, but you can find all eight test videos via the link. They had slightly better results than with the PW’s than I did, but their similar findings seemed to confirm that I did not have a faulty set. The bottom line was still that Radio Poppers worked better. Whatever you decide, get out there and get your flash off camera. The results can be magical. Have fun, Gav
Thanks for the review Gavin! We were just about to purchase Pocket Wizzards… then I heard about your experience and did further research online and went ahead and purchased Radio Poppers!! Thanks again!
Thanks for the info, now i really understand how the Radio Poppers work. What a shame that the Pocket Wizards, being highly regarded, brought some faulty units. Worst, i think, its customer service. As you say, Epic Fail!!! Thanks for the review!!
I have a pair of TT5’s, I am getting misfires at about 6 metres with direct line of sight not using ETTL. I have PW plus II’s as well that work flawlessly.
The TT5’s are an excellent build but they do not work as promised. I will be requesting a refund.
The review was great. Will you be doing an update on the Mini TT1 & Flex TT5 with the latest firmware and the AC5 soft shield by Pocketwizard?
Not likely unless PW wants to send me some to look at. I here more and more bad about them and having to wrap a $500 set of transmitters in a shield to make them work correctly is a joke. PW needs to go back to the drawing board and do it right. Eventually they might be able to win back my coincidence, but the flex series is like a slap in the face to professionals and they never should have shipped.
I used to use the pocket wizard II with great result – although manual only. I was therefor excited to hear of the new TTl units, sold my old ones and ordered them in good faith. I cant even get a result at 10 feet let alone 100… I was trying to use them with my canon 580EX speedlites and had no reliable rersults at all – not at any distance! I understand they may work with studio units however… I will be ordering the radio poppers now for sure!
I have the new Flex units, mine are brand new as of March 2010 and work brilliantly. Yes, I have a flash condom on them that was supplied with the transceivers but the units have been working exceptionally well. I am going to do a distance test as soon as possible.
Good to know Kerry. Though I don’t really consider having to cover the flash acceptable. Totally janky. Curios to see what range you get. I’ve never seen a report that got over 120 ish feet and they claim way more than that. I could barley get 30 with any reliability when I did my original review. Having tried both systems I say there’s no contest.
So the next question is where is the best place to buy the Poppers?
You can get them direct from the Radio Poppers website. That’s where I got mine.
Kerry, you are very lucky. I had to sent one of my flashes back to Canon because for some reason, the Flexes have burnt them twice. Canon replaced the batt ass’y, head ass’y and so on. Now, I have one unit in Canon Services waiting to be fixed for the second time, and I found out that my second flash is not working properly with no ETTL and no way to control exposure while on Manual…. a total mess. So I contacted PW and I’m sending this three Flexes back to them to get a refund, plain and simple. I was so excited about this units! I’l go with the RPs for sure.
I recently bought the Nikon version of these and after some initial enthusiasm for the new found creative freedom, I got more and more frustrated with them. Work alongside a fellow photographer with Radio Poppers and they outclassed the Pocket Wizards shot after shot. No nukes frames, no misfires, no I-TTL wtf’s. I’ve given up with the PW’s and have ordered a set of Poppers.