External speed lights for mirrorless cameras

If you shoot a mirrorless camera or compact system camera (”CSC”) you’ll know that standard sized speed lights are just too big for on camera use. Sure, these speed lights fit in the camera’s hot shoe, and you can use them for flash photography but the setup is cumbersome, unbalanced and not nice to use. If you want a speed light that is more suited to the size of your mirrorless camera or CSC you need a smaller and lighter speed light.

Small speed lights have been around for a long time and aren’t anything new, however the old small speed lights were typically cheap and nasty. The traditional small speed lights were basic, low powered and poor quality.

Times have changed, technology has moved on and with the rise in popularity of mirrorless cameras and CSCs there is a new breed of small speed lights. These speed lights are powerful (with a high guide number), full of technology (with manual, ETTL, high speed sync and stroboscopic modes), fully controllable and very well made. These small speed lights are high spec and a smaller and more compact version of standard speed lights.

If you want to do some flash photography with your mirrorless camera or CSC one of these small speed lights is something you should use. A mirrorless camera/CSC and small speed light combination is a balanced setup that is not only a pleasure (not to mention easy) to use but will also improve your flash photos.

The choice of small speed lights isn’t huge, however it is growing all the time, and the models that get a lot of attention include:-

Godox TT350 (Full review here)

guide number (35mm @ iso 100) – 36m/ focal length coverage – 24mm – 105mm/ recycling time – 0.1 – 2.2 secs/ ettl - yes/ ev compensation on flash - +/- 3ev/ slave - yes/ vertical tilt – 0 – 90 degrees/ horizontal tilt – 0 – 90 degrees/ dimensions – 140mm x 62mm x 38mm/ approx price $USD/£GBP -  $85/£70/ power – 2xaa batteries

Nissin i40 (Full review here)

guide number (35mm @ iso 100) – 27m / focal length coverage – 24mm – 105mm / recycling time – 0.1 – 4 secs/ ettl - yes / ev compensation on flash - +/- 2ev / slave - yes / vertical tilt – 0 – 90 degrees/ horizontal tilt – 0 – 180 degrees/ dimensions – 100mm x 50mm x 50mm/ approx price $USD/£GBP - $230/£155/ power – 4xaa batteries

Metz 26 (Full review here)

guide number (35mm @ iso 100) – 26m/ focal length coverage – 24mm – 85mm/ recycling time – 0.3 – 8 secs/ ettl - yes/ ev compensation on flash - +/- 3ev/ slave - yes/ vertical tilt – 0 – 890 degrees/ horizontal tilt - none/ dimensions – 63mm x 85mm x 85mm/ approx price $USD/£GBP - $140/£75/ power – 2xaaa batteries

Canon 270EX (Full review here)

guide number (35mm @ iso 100) – 27m/ focal length coverage – 28mm – 50mm/ recycling time – 0.1 – 4 secs/ ettl - yes/ ev compensation on flash - no/ slave - yes/ vertical tilt – 0 – 90 degrees/ horizontal tilt - no/ dimensions – 77mm x 66mm x 65mm/ approx price $USD/£GBP - $170/£180/ power – 2xaa batteries

Don’t struggle with a large and over sized speed light for your mirrorless camera or CSC check out the above small speed lights and your flash photography will not only improve but also be more fun too. 

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