Flash practise

[Alison]

I hope I am posting this in the right place. I just thought this info might help other people who are afraid of using their flash because of harsh results.

Now I, and everyone else here, knows how much I love window light portraits. But I think there are times when flash is needed and I don't want to be afraid of it anymore.

So I had a practise with fill flash, both indoors and outdoors, using my pop up flash not my speedlite.
I couldn't believe the results. :thumbsup:

I still got flash shadows when my subjects were too close to the bg but not half as bad as in the past. I really enjoyed playing yesterday. Getting that "eureka moment" when I finally knew how to predict what my flash was going to do.

Here's what worked for me...
I turned my flash exposure compensation down to -2.
Metered my light as I normally would, in camera, getting the correct exposure for no flash. Then I underexposed to the 1 to 1.5 mark.
Popped my flash up and these were the results.

All I can say is "wow"! I am incredibly happy!

Both indoor photographs are Manual mode, ISO 400, f/4.0, SS 1/60
Outdoor shot was Manual mode, ISO 100, f/8.0, SS 1/200. (This was a little over-exposed but I corrected that in photoshop. Still pretty happy with the result though).

Feel free to post your own flash practises here. But please tell us what you did to get your results.

[another view]

Looks great! Also, the fact that you used a flash is not obvious, which means that you have it down. As photographers, we can sometimes tell from experience that flash was used because otherwise there would be shadows - but it's not the huge blast of light that's common with flash use. Thanks for posting this.

[Alison]

Flash shadow's are something I absolutely loathe. so, it's something I have been determined to eliminate, or try to anyway.
You can still see flash shadows are present just under Wesley's hand and hubby's arm and also in shot #2 there are shadows under Trinny's arm and just around her outline at the back. And in the last shot you can just see a tiny flash dot on the right lens of Danielle's glasses.

I may have been incorrect in my first lot of instructions because when I tried it again today it wasn't working. (Sorry) :mad2:

So, I tried this...
Still with my flash exp comp reduced, popped up my flash 1st, then used my in-camera light meter under exposing by 0.5 :thumbsup:

I WILL get there in the end!

[readingr]

Alison,

Are you using the pop up flash on the camera?

Roger

[Alison]

Yes, but I am just trying to use it as a fill flash.

[SmartWombat]

Bounce flash from the ceiling, 580EX with 1D.
Huge windows behind stretching the length of the room, so deep shadow to fill.

http://forums.photographyreview.com/...16458#poststop
Left image, fill flash.
Right image, no flash - recovered form RAW in Lightroom 1.0

[readingr]

I always use my 430EX to bounce the flash off walls, ceilings... rather than use it directly unless the subject is a long way away and have really bright light source to compete with.

Never used the flash on board the camera for anything really. I'll dig some of mine out a little later.

Roger

[Alison]

Thanks guys.

Yeah I can use my 430EX but I was trying to test things out to see if I can learn how to predict how the shot is going to turn out.
It's all very well saying it's digital you can do it over and over again but you can't at a wedding! I NEED to understand what I have to do to get the flash results I desire.

I have a neat little trick that I use with my 430EX. I used it at my Uncle's party and never saw one flash shadow it was great!
I based it on the better bounce card except the difference is EVERYONE carries it round with them and it's not tied to the flash.
I feel the better bounce card would be limited whenever you want to turn the flash.

I have a Gary Fong lightsphere and an omni bounce diffuser but all of these, including bouncing flash can leave shadows.

So, here's a pic of my little trick and a photograph using that technique. It softens every shadow. Trust me, try it, it works!

[SmartWombat]

Or you could turn the flash head around and bounce all of the flash off the wall behind you !
Surely that is more efficient than lighting up your hand ?

You're roughly doubling the area of the flash that gets bounced, at the expense of far less reflectance.
So you are losing flash range, if that matters.
On the other hand if you're getting too close it would reduce the flash intensity.
But with bouncing you lose the catchlights, have you tried the little pull out white thingy?

For shadow reduction, I use a small softbox on the front of the flash.
This is the 8" version, but there is a larger 10".
As you can see, close up on the kitten it's smoothed the light pretty well.

[Alison]

But if there's no wall behind me I can't use that technique.

I may try that one tomorrow though. I'm always open to suggestions lol.

[SmartWombat]

But if there's no wall behind me

Then if there's no wall behind you then you are using a pink softbox that transmits almost no light ... a hand !

Do you want to borrow my softbox for a try out?
As you can see it folds flat and is easy to pop in the post.
It fits with velcro to my flash, you could use elastic bands for a test.

[Alison]

Wow! And that's direct flash?
It would be nice to borrow it yes, but it would be even better if I owned one

[livin4lax09]

you can make a softbox like that for less than 5 dollars. all you need is some cardboard and ripstop nylon.

the idea is just to make it so you have as many light sources as possible. the whiter the walls, the less shadows you have. the reason you are getting less shadows with your hand there is because you are blocking any direct light from the flash, and also preventing the flash from reaching the area of the ceiling directly above your subject, so therefore most of your light is coming from in front of your subject, which is why you have the shadowless face. and if you're bouncing off a big bright ceiling, the shadows are definitely going to be softened.

What determines your shadow softness is just the relative size of the light source compared to the subject. as the big kahuna said, if you could pull the sun within a few yards of your subject, it would be the softest light source. But since it's so far away it's very small relatively, so it's a horrible light source.

[Skyman]

my tried and true technique doesn't work so well with digital. I have a sunpack gs 4500 bracket flash and a softbox similar to SmartWombat's the flash is completely manual but you can set the aperture, so that is what i do, set the flash to whatever the lens is set at. the softbox gives great light and drops the exposure of the flash so that it gives perfect fill everytime. i tend to use my 550 and 580 on my digitals though and my results are not so hot. i think i need to get a bracket and although the built in diffusers and bounce cards work well enough they are not as nice as the sunpack even without the softbox. so it must be something i am doing wrong in setting exposure compensation or something. oh and since i have a 550 and 580 i am experimenting with radio ettl. I must say i am not having much success. In theory i should be able to tell the camera that i want the flash off to the side (the radio one) as my main flash and the flash on the camera as my fill flash and the ettl system should be able to handle the exposure and flash ratios, even when balancing this with ambient light on an automatic setting. well that is what the canon flash propoganda claims. i have yet to work out the manual settings and whilst i can get my slave to fire in wireless mode, i have had better succes on manual using sensors to trigger my slaves. at least if the flash is going to pump out full power every time i can either move it away or filter it so i get the balance right. when i get it right i would also want to use the second flash to fix inverse square flash fall off when talking photos of large groups (like at receptions)

[SmartWombat]

Wow! And that's direct flash?
It would be nice to borrow it yes, but it would be even better if I owned one

Yep, that's direct flash.
It's not magic, you can see there are shadows and a huge rectangular catchlight.
Neat part of it is that it has reflective interior, so if the flash is set to widest zoom and has the clear wide diffuser down then you get a good even light.

If you didn't want a folding one it would be easy to make, I think.
It seems to be the same silvery material as used on reflectors, maybe it's made out of offcuts after they make the curved triflectas

[Alison]

I'm still practising. This was yesterday using my pop up flash. Although, John tells me the pop up flash is practically useless. Surely not, in this close proximity?
These are totally sooc. Pretty good results I thought.

I must break out my speedlite and get some extra practise with that too.

#1 - Manual mode, f/5.0, SS 1/100, ISO 100, Flash fired
#2 - Manual mode, f/14.0, SS 1/100, ISO 100, Flash not fired
#3 - Manual mode, f/11.0, SS 1/100, ISO 100, Flash fired
(hmmm strange. I would have thought my f number would have had to be about f14 with the flash on. I still don't think I'm getting it :mad2: ).

I can see that the shadow's aren't totally eliminated but they are certainly filled somewhat.

[Alison]

By George I think I've got it! lol.
Speedlite practise.
These are 100% sooc. I'm not bothered about composition or bg's etc. I'm just trying to understand how my flash works with my camera and what I can do to get the results I want to acheive.

Attach flash > turn flash on > meter light on the face and under expose to the number 1.
If shooting white, meter on the white and then under expose.
Shoot! Voila!

#1 - Gary Fong Lightsphere attached. Bounced light off the wall behind her.
Manual mode, ISO 200, f/3.5, SS 1/160

#2 - Camera held in portrait orientation with the flash on my left, (kinda made sense...sun on my right flash to fill on my left), and pointing directlly at my subject. Gary Fong Lightsphere attached.
Manual mode, ISO 200, f/11.0, SS 1/100

[Alison]

Yep, I'm definitely there!
What I am aiming for is to use my flash but trying to minimize the fact that I have used it if that makes any sense.

Anyway, I took this today, at 5:23pm, in my back garden.
It was pretty overcast at the time and the light wasn't good. I mean, I was already on ISO 400. (I don't suppose it helped much that I still had my polarizer on lol).
My shutter was set to 1/100 could've set that to 60 but I use 100 as my image stabiliser lol.
Just used my pop up flash 2 stops down.

I am very happy with the results today and if I take pictures like this at the weddings I will be over the moon!

I'd love to know what you think.

EXIF:
50mm f/1.8 MK II lens
Manual mode
ISO 400
SS 1/100
F/7.1

[another view]

What I am aiming for is to use my flash but trying to minimize the fact that I have used it if that makes any sense.

Perfect sense, and that's a great goal to "shoot" for (pun intended...). I can also see that you're there! The polarizer doesn't help here, and actually hurts by costing you at least one stop of light.

Polarizers work when light is at 90 degrees to the lens, and the flash was on the camera so it was probably only a degree or two off from the axis of the lens. If you had a blue sky with some white clouds, you could have used it to enhance the sky but it throws another variable into the exposure and might make it a little tricky. IOW, I probably wouldn't use a polarizer and flash unless I really wanted the effect. Great work, though!

[Alison]

Thank you
By the way here's a bit if useless info...did you realise your initials stand for aperture priority...how cool!!! LOL

[another view]

did you realise your initials stand for aperture priority...

Didn't think about that, but I'm a Nikon shooter and they just use "A"... Oh, and that's just my stage name!

[Alison]

All my flash practise paid off! Yay! :thumbsup:
(Shame about the back window though.) :cryin: