First Play with a Flash other than the onboard

[poompy]

Well i have been given a Canon Speedlight 299T to play around with for a little while. I cannot believe the difference between the onboard and this.

Camera Gear:
Canon 350D and kit 18-55

I set the flash to F-Number selection to 5.6 and iso 200

Camera settings were
ISO: 200
F: 5.6
Shutter: 1/60

I bounce the flash to the left and upwards from the cat. The cat was the only available subject. Arent pets great!

Let me know what you think as this is my first shot with another flash so i have a lot to learn.

[Yi-P]

Arent external flashes just great?

Its a must have in every photo bag

[Oscar]

Cool shot Poompy. Sharp and nice exposure. Well done.

Cheers, Mick

[Mr Darcy]

Once you use external flash for a while you will join the "Popups should be banned" brigade.

Perhaps a white reflector close in (or a second flash!) to add some highlights.

Greg

[poompy]

Once you use external flash for a while you will join the "Popups should be banned" brigade.

Perhaps a white reflector close in (or a second flash!) to add some highlights.

Greg

seecond flash ive got a hard enough task infront of me convincing the wife that an external flash is a necessity!!

i will jump on the "Popups should be banned" brigade after doing some more playing around i have found the onboard to be utterly crap!

[digitor]

This is a nice shot! (even though it's of a cat... ) but anyway, you're lucky having a feline of the 18% reflectance variety!

Sadly, my cat is extremely black, and sort of like a black hole, it absorbs all photons in the immediate vicinity.

This leads to all sorts of exposure troubles.

Cheers

[Mr Darcy]

seecond flash ive got a hard enough task infront of me convincing the wife that an external flash is a necessity!!

Yes Second Flash.
I bought an SB600 with my D70s, and almost immediately realised its limitations. I picked up an SB800 within a couple of months for a good price off eBay. The combination of the two can be magic. Now all I need to do is convince my wife that I need a third for those highlights

Oh and a cable so I can use the first one off camera, or even better a D200 so I can do it all wirelessly.

Greg

[stetner]

you're lucky having a feline of the 18% reflectance variety!

Sadly, my cat is extremely black, and sort of like a black hole, it absorbs all photons in the immediate vicinity.

If mine sees me with my camera, she slips into a worm hole and disappears! I must have blasted her a few to many times when I first got my gear!

[PiroStitch]

having an external flash is one thing...wait till you start using it OFF the camera

[gstark]

or even better a D200 so I can do it all wirelessly.

You can do that with your D70.

I do, for both the SB800 and/or my studio flash units.

Use the IR/iTTL for the SB800 (can't remember the channel settings) or just dial down the power, kill the preflash, and use the onboard as a trigger for the studio unit.

And, properly controlled, the onboard flash can be very useful: it's great for fill, or to just help balance the lights in some more difficult lighting scenarios.

Poompy,

Does the 350D have FEC? I know it was an omission from the 300D and many users noticed that deficiency, but if you have it available, it's a feature that is well worth exploring.

[poompy]

i will have to see gstark. what will that allow me to do differently?

[gstark]

It permits you to dial down the amount of flash power being used to help make your exposure.

I typically shoot with my flash power dialled down to somewhere between -0.7 and -1.3 EV. Great for filling shadows, or to help cope with poor quality or badly coloured light.

[poompy]

confirmed the 350d has FEC will have a play with it tonight.

[Mr Darcy]

You can do that with your D70.

Not to the extent I want to.
I know I can fire the SB800 and SB600 remotely, but they have to be set the same. I cannot have the 800 fire at full power & the 600 at 0.25 power.
I don't have studio lights. I wish I did, but I need to be mobile, and the flashes enable that.

Also, the popup contributes SOME light to the final picture no matter what I do. Normally it's trivial, but I am taking photos of highly reflective objects at the moment (Bottles with gilt labels) and I couldn't get rid of a direct reflection until I placed a card in front of the onboard.

Now I am using the 800 onboard to control the 600 remotely. I am bouncing both, and still using a card to block any direct light from the flashes. It is getting better, but I am still not there yet.

I will drop a sample into beginners questions in a few days as I cannot crack the solution, but I am busy with other things at the moment.

Greg

[gstark]

Greg,

You can do that with your D70.

Not to the extent I want to.
I know I can fire the SB800 and SB600 remotely, but they have to be set the same. I cannot have the 800 fire at full power & the 600 at 0.25 power.

With careful placement and diffusers, you can do all manner of things.

Also, you might like to consider the acquisition of stuff like a pocket wizard or maybe some light triggers for the off-camera units. These will permit you to use them in modes other than iTTL, which affords you a much greater level of control than what you're currently being frustrated by.

Do you have a handheld lightmeter/flashmeter?

I don't have studio lights. I wish I did, but I need to be mobile, and the flashes enable that.

Using a few simple implements, such as noted above, will permit you to do this. Also, there are some very inexpensive kits available. These provide lightstands, brollies, and small flash heads for a fraction of the price of an SB800. Indeed, the cost of the units I've seen approaches the cost of just a stand + brolly from Vanbar (who are not at all expensive/unreasonable to begin with) and thus you can add quite a bit of versatility to your kit for very few $$$$.

Also, the popup contributes SOME light to the final picture no matter what I do. Normally it's trivial,

It should be less than trivial.

A couple of months back somebody did some tests of exactly this, and proved that any light added by the popup contributed nothing at all to the exposure/image.

If you find that you're seeing the lighting affecting your exposure, then there's a problem in how you're setting the flash. If you're seeing too many reflections in the image, then it may be an issue in your posing/presentation of the subject matter: do you have a light tent, for instance?

Now I am using the 800 onboard to control the 600 remotely. I am bouncing both, and still using a card to block any direct light from the flashes. It is getting better, but I am still not there yet.

I think that you should be able to use the 800 to control the 600, and also to have the 600 using different settings from the 800: it needs to be set to be a controller, rather than a slave.

I will drop a sample into beginners questions in a few days as I cannot crack the solution, but I am busy with other things at the moment.

As and when you're ready.

[Mr Darcy]

This is getting too far off topic.
I will opena new thread to resolve this issue in a few days, when I hopefully have time to follow up on suggestions.


Greg