Backscatter Mini Flash 2 with Sea and Sea Housing

[MrChen]

I have a Nikon D850 with Sea and Sea MDX850 housing and YS-N converter. I've posted about my recent problems with my YS-01 strobes, so I purchased a MF2 since I'm without srobes and wanted a snoot strobe.

The MF2 doesn't fire if I put my converter in manual mode. In TTL mode it fires about 75% of the time in testing out of the water. I have the converter set to 01 since I usually use it with my ys01 strobes.

Does anyone have any setting advice?

 

[MrChen]

So I took the strobe on a dive. Underwater it only fired 1 out of every 7 times. I swapped between TTL and manual on the YS optical converter. It did fire a few times on manual, but less often than when I had it in TTL mode. This makes using the snoot extremely challenging. It's already hard enough to aim the light on a slightly moving target, in a current, controlling buoyancy, and now I have to fire the camera in rapid succession until it works.

 

[MrChen]

I'm posting additional details in the hopes that it helps someone else one day.

I ran a few tests. I left the strobe in manual and tried all settings on the YS-N converter. I tried each setting with the YS-N in TTL mode and then in manual. This made no difference.

I reached out to a buddy who suggested there was a sync that needed to happen and suggested I RTFM (thanks bro ). As I was reading it again, I realized there are two TTL modes supported by the strobe, one for Olympus cameras and one for other cameras called HSS. I switched the YS-N to TTL and the strobe to HSS and the strobe fired every time with a but... But every picture was black, no matter how slow I put the shutter speed or how large I opened the aperture. I tried each setting on the YS-N for strobe compatibility, and it made no difference. Frustrated, I switched the YS-N to manual mode, to my surprise, the strobe continued to fire every time and pictures were lit up. I repeat, it works (out of the water) with the strobe in HSS mode and the YS-N in manual mode.

I still need to test it in the water. I'm concerned with my ability to adjust strobe power. Per the manual, only power levels 7, 6, and 5 are available in HSS mode.

I'll report back after I get a dive in.

 

[MrChen]

Well... I was reading another thread about the MF2 and added my 2 cents of problems. I now have this working with the YS-N on manual and the strobe on manual. The trick is the auto sync, but you have to realize how it works and behaves.

Turn it all on, set to manual on converter and strobe. Take a picture, the strobe will NOT produce a flash. This is what was throwing me off. I'd look at the camera and the strobe, waiting maybe 2 seconds, and try again. Instead, understand that it won't flash, wait 3+ seconds, and the dang thing works every time I trigger to take a picture.