Well, as previously reported at Slightly Out of Focus, Nikon did finally release the new, smaller SB-400 Speedlight.

The article here at Photography Blog tells you all about it via the Nikon Press release.

It’s a nice portable unit, with a guide number of 30 that’d be great for those short trips where you don’t want to lug a bigger (SB-600, SB-800) speedlight BUT it isn’t compatible with the wireless flash (i-TTL yes, but IR no).

Rats…..

No handheld flash pictures, no creative bounce at any angle you want with no wires to get in the way….no abilty to hand-hold a flash that is actually hand-holdable (unlike the bigger units which can get slippery to hold after a while).

What’s a mother to do?

I guess the small-size doesn’t allow for all the wireless goodies inside the body of the flash…so it looks like I’ll be forced to buy a Radio-slave unit of some sort (PocketWizard or Cheap e-bay equivalent?….Probably the PocketWizard to ensure reliability…sigh).

Oh well….Maybe I can get a D-40 and use that as a external-flash for my D-200??…Maybe not…..