Yongnuo YN-560 Speedlight Flash for Canon and Nikon

Most helpful customer reviews

140 of 145 people found the following review helpful.
Great value in a manual flash
By Kian O'Connell
I haven't shot enough with it to determine consistency, but I'm pleased so far. Flash is a bit large for the output, but it is still decent. I did some test shots and was getting f8 at 18 ft. This tells me that the GN is just about 144. The specs put it at just 58. (Maybe that was supposed to be meters and not feet). This is almost as good as I got from the Sunpak PZ42XC at full on manual.
Build is similar to the Sunpak flashes. Swivel and bounce feel no less solid and click into place just fine without shifting. The built in diffuser AND mini bounce card are nice although small. My sunpak PZ42XC doesn't have that. There is a PC sync and a power supply connection on the side which my sunpak doesn't have either. Then there is the optical slave which works well with two levels of sensitivity and of course my sunpak lacks that as well.
With all of that said, this flash isn't for just anybody. This is just a plain dumb manual flash without TTL or even a thyristor. THERE IS NO AUTO FUNCTION. If your intent is to use this as a camera mounted flash for candids, forget it unless you know how to manually setup for every shot by adjusting your aperture as needed. It is not intended for that purpose.

The flash came with a base that has a threaded hole in the bottom so it can be mounted to a stand. It would do a terrific job providing fill or backlight capability. It swivels 180 degrees and straight up so bouncing into an umbrella or through a diffuser while the slave sensor faces forward for a stationary photo shoot are ideal uses of this flash. So is placing it behind a subject for a backlight. My Lumiquest gel holder fits very tight due to the large flash head, but it fits.

The controls and lights on the back seem a bit confusing and the manual isn't a lot of help since the translation from Chinese to English is about the same quality as you get from Google translate..... I was able to figure it out but it took some time experimenting with the unit.

Recharge is quick - even at full power. I was very impressed. Of course it has less output than the Sunpak and uses the same number of batteries but still, I was pleased.

One other note. When i first tried to turn it on it wouldn't do anything and I was immediately afraid it was DOA. I found that to turn it on, you must hold the on-off button for a couple seconds. When you press it down, the lights on the bar progress from left to right and if you don't hold it down till the lights get to the far right, it just shuts off. Awkward, but easy to deal with if you are aware of it.

Altogether, I'm quite pleased with what I have assuming it lasts a a while. The build seems solid so I'll just have to wait and see. I'm confident enough in the product that I'm going to buy a second one so I can have one for fill and the other for a backlight for impromptu studio shots.

If you need a slave flash with some power and manual controls I really think this is the best thing out there. Almost everything else in this price range is a single power or auto-flash without the ability to make manual output adjustments. You can get this output with no slave, the slave with no manual,or you can spend twice as much. But if you need a speedlight with auto functions for camera mounted shots, get something with auto functions.

96 of 100 people found the following review helpful.
I love this thing!
By Albert Jurina III
So I already own a canon 430ex II, and was trying to determine whether this flash was worth it. I am so glad that I bought it. I am a professional photographer who shoots mainly natural light, but wanted another flash for flexibility with off camera lighting scenarios. This thing rocks! In one job, I had accidentally turned off a remote receiver and thought that it was dead. This would have ruined the shoot, but thankfully the yn560 has a built-in optical slave that worked flawlessly and saved my neck! I have been using it with my canon 430 ex II (both off camera) with great results. I don't recommend this flash to people with the following needs:

1. TTL - it doesn't have it, manual only.
2. An LCD screen with menus and lots of options - this flash is pretty simple in terms of features.
3. A person new to flash photography intending to use it on camera with subjects of varying distances - if you don't know what you are doing with flash, it is a better idea to just buy the ttl flash first and then play with the manual flashes when you've had more time for study and experience.
4. People just trying to get a cheap flash. - this flash is certainly inexpensive, but the named brand flashes from Canon and Nikon are very nice. If you are going to own one flash, get a good one first with ttl and more features.

Lastly, don't let the comparisons of canon or Nikon flashes trick you. Those flashes are durable, reliable, and feature rich. This flash is great for manual flash work and off camera lighting. I love how it works for those things. I am even considering buying another one or two down the road.

63 of 65 people found the following review helpful.
Great manual flash
By P. Hartung
For the money, I am amazed at how powerful, useful, and effective the 560's are. Since I bought mine, Yongnuo has added a metal shoe foot which is an even better reason to get these for strobist work. Beyond the fine manual control (full to 1/128th power w/micro adjustments between stops, zooms from 24-105mm) there's two variants of optical slave control built in - one simple and the other which ignores pre-flash, and this can be helpful if you don't have wireless receivers.

Some cons:
~ weird interface that is not immediately user friendly but becomes so after study and experience
~ inconsistent recycles both in terms of power and timing (variance in output is more than I'd hope, and even when the power is turned down to 1/64th or 1/128th high speed continuous is hit and miss) but this isn't an issue when not shooting high frame rate or when half second intervals or longer are employed
~ base/front is so deep that my particular wireless receivers must be powered on/off only when removed from the flash itself, but this isn't a knock when using other receivers
~ sometimes I turn the annoying beep feature off and it comes back on after restarting the flash

Despite those knocks, I still give it five stars due to the overwhelming upside. Full power is nearly at the high end of what flashguns can do, and it does recycle at full faster than most too. The fit and finish is a copy of Canon's 580EXII and so exceeds this price point. The ability to accept external power packs as well as a PC sync cable is really nice. Anyone who's looking to add more remote lights that are reliable and accepting of multiple ways of triggering should grab a couple of these.

FYI...I have used several Nikon SB800's and Sigma EF500 DG Super flashguns for years, and these complement what we do.