Why won't my Nikon D70S take photos with flash?
Why won't my Nikon D70S take photos with flash?
Added (1). It takes photos without flash fine. When I try to take a photo with flash it will pop up and fire a flash but it won't capture an image or even make a sound besides what sounds like a misfiring flash.
Added (2). Sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't. It pops up and makes a flash but doesn't shoot photo.
If it pops up, but nothing else works… It's broken. Stuff happens, it's old. Repair cost (if possible) will be more than the camera is worth.
Time to get a new camera. Not necessarily brand new, but something not as old as a D70s. D3x00 models are on the used market pretty cheap now.
Does an external flash work? That might be a solution if you need a flash and don't want to buy a new camera. Should be able to find one pretty cheap.
Does the 70S allow you to adjust the flash s power - maybe it's been set too low? What about using a remote flash - has it been set to act as a trigger rather than a light source? As a general rule it's best not to use the pop up flash - even the cheapest speedlights are a huge improvement.
Set to M mode, 1/60s, f/22, ISO 100 and raise the flash. Take a picture. If that didn't work, set lens to MF, focus manually and try again. If that still did not work, with a camera that old, I highly suspect the flash is fried already.
If the flash is busted already, it will be much easier and cheaper for you to buy another D70 or D70S rather than have that one fixed. Test everything including the flash before paying.
All DSLRs have shutters that open during the exposure. Due to the way that the shutters open, once the shutter speed gets to a certain speed, there's no time where all of the shutter blades are out of the way. In other words, there's a limit to how fast of a shutter speed you can use which is called the camera's flash sync speed.
The flash sync speed for the Nikon D70S is probably 1/125th. If you take a photo in, say, manual exposure mode and your chosen shutter speed is faster than 1/125th (e.g. 1/500th) then the camera will not use the flash, or it may not take the shot at all. This is because the camera knows that taking a shot with flash at a speed faster than 1/125th will result in black bands on the image where the shutter blades had blocked the light. This, of course, does not apply to high-speed sync flashes which allow for any shutter speed.
So if your camera won't take the shot, and you know that the focusing isn't an issue, it's probably because your shutter speed (either in Manual (M) or Shutter Priority (Tv) was set too fast.
If you take a shot and the flash does fire but the picture is black or too dark, then that could be a result of a few things. First, the most likely cause is that instead of being in Program or Auto, the camera was set to manual mode where the aperture chosen was too small for the distance to the subject. If you're 10' away from your subject, your ISO is set to 100, and you're using the internal flash, you best have an aperture of f/1 or else the image will be underexposed. G/N divided by distance = your aperture. The D70s has an embarrassing low G/N of just 11. In comparison, an external flash will likely have a G/N of about 120 which means that it's 128x stronger than the internal flash of the D70s.
It sounds to me that your ISO is set too low and you are shooting a subject that is beyond the effective flash range. The camera will take the shot even if it knows that the resulting image will be too dark or even completely black. However, it will have a blinking icon in the viewfinder and/or LCD screen indicating that the settings that you chose will result in an underexposed shot. Even if you're using full auto or program mode, if your ISO is set too low and your lens doesn't have a large enough aperture and your focusing distance is too far, the camera will still take the shot which will be extremely underexposed.
What you need to do is read the manual. Understand the signs (e.g. Blinking icons) that the camera is using to inform you that something is not quite right. You also need to get an external flash. Nikon makes a lot of various models, but those from other brands that are a lot cheaper will work just as well.
Set it to " P "…
It's an old camera, time to update…