430 EXII.
This is really the beginning for me, that's it. I've never really shot with flash, but if there are things to read, that would be great. I'm not doing anything studio or crazy. Just some casual shooting with the flash on camera.
All I know is to 90 degree bounce for now especially if im shooting in typical indoor places with regular height ceilings. Dunno what to expect with trickier situations though....
Excellent...It's a great flash. Few things for you.
1. You can bounce off anything, just remember: the color of the surface matters, lol.
2. You can indeed get pro quality shots with on camera flash, but you won't get them right away.
3. The Gary Fong lightspheres and other stuff like that are not worth buying, don't do it...instead...go to photography on the net forums and look for "better bounce card". You need to throw some light forward, but just a little--to get a little fill and to give catch lights in the eyes.
4. I use black velcro (looks great) and have a small square (same width as flash) piece of white light-diffusing material (with a piece of velcro on it) from an old Gretag Masterlab minilab printer as my "bounce card"--it basically glows and radiates light forward it works great...that's probably not an option for you, but don't despair, the non-glossy side of photo paper works great too...It just looks ghetto. But meh.
Also, 996 is right in that old flash units can work just as well for off camera use ( i use a $5 salvation army sunpak flash i found, works great, for example )--however, that's not always true, and is one of those "it depends" things. Having wireless ETTL is nice if you aren't in a studio where the subject is stationary. (love that I can trigger directly from 7d!) High speed sync is fun. The 430exII and 580exII are top flashes, build quality is excellent, and the mounting mechanism is worth the money imho.