How to Set the Commander Mode Flash Feature on Nikon D750/D7200/D7500

Hey there, this is Kush Sharma, your Photography instructor and the author of Off-Camera Flash for Beginners Course , a 4 hour long course designed to help you master your off-camera flash or speedlight for Portraits (available via Udemy.com).

In this post, we will learn how to set the commander mode on the Nikon D750/D7200/D7500 cameras.

Using the commander mode can enable you to trigger an external flash from your pop-up flash on the camera. Let’s look at the steps involved in setting up the commander mode:

1. Press the menu button on your camera and then go to the custom setting menu and then select the option Bracketing/Flash, as shown in the image below:

2. Then select the Flash cntrl for built-in flash option, as shown in the image below:

3. Then select the Commander mode option as shown below:

4. Now you’ll see the screen below:

Here, next to the Built-in flash, you’ll see the “–” setting under the Mode option. This means that you’re telling the camera that the effect of the pop-up flash should be minimal. This means that the pop-up flash will only be used to trigger the external flash and not have much of an impact on our subject.

The next important thing is setting up the correct group and channel. This will depend on what channel and group is your external flash set-up at. They both have to match. For instance, you can see below that I have set my Nikon SB-700 to Group A and Channel 1 in the remote mode (slave mode):

5. Once this all is set up, you will find that your external flash is pulsing the red light, which means it’s open to receiving a signal. Open up the pop-up flash and test whether it is triggering the external flash.

That’s it. I hope this post helped you set the commander mode on your Nikon camera. If you have any questions, do leave them in the comments below and I’ll be happy to help you out!