Amber in Daylight: Slow shutter speed and a (fairly) Wide Aperture

[Sean Setters]

I had a wonderful model tonight (Amber, as usual). I'll probably post the best from the series on flickr tomorrow. I just sorted through them this evening and picked out a few favs...

[greggf]

Great shot Sean. Seems like you went through a whole lot of prep to get that shot!! Have you tried putting your camera on high speed sync, in manual mode, then you use the aperture for the subject with flash, and shutter speed for the ambient. Joe Mcnally has several books on the subject,and teaches this in his seminars. Tried it out, and it works fantastic. A little trial and error involved, but once you get it down, you can foo with multiple lights, so on and so forth. I have some examples if you're interested(that I have recently shot).

[Sean Setters]

Great shot Sean. Seems like you went through a whole lot of prep to get that shot!! Have you tried putting your camera on high speed sync, in manual mode, then you use the aperture for the subject with flash, and shutter speed for the ambient. Joe Mcnally has several books on the subject,and teaches this in his seminars. Tried it out, and it works fantastic. A little trial and error involved, but once you get it down, you can foo with multiple lights, so on and so forth. I have some examples if you're interested(that I have recently shot).
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Usually that's done by using all Canon flashes. I've tried it before using a 580EX on the camera's hotshoe and using optical slaves to trigger the off-camera slaves. The only problem is that you have to use the off-camera slaves at full power to capture the full burst of light emitted from the flash (flash durations are longer at full power and can cover the shutter opening/closing from what I understand).


To be honest, I'm the inconvenience of only being able to use full-power, coupled with the fact that each flash has to be able to "see" the hotshoe-mounted flash (in daylight) makes it a less than convenient solution.


If I'm wrong, or there is indeed a better solution, I'm all ears!

[jcrowe87]

[Edit]


*sigh* I blame fault internet for this double post.

[jcrowe87]

While the full power may be necessary to underexpose the ambient, it isn't really necessary for the shutter speed side of things.


You are indeed correct that a full power flash is longer than one at a fraction of its power, if you are shooting something around 1/160 like you did here it shouldn't make any difference. The main issue with flash coverage isn't that the flash covers the entire duration of the exposure, but rather that the flash isn't cut off by either of the curtains, which would leave an ugly dark band on the top or bottom of an image. Thankfully flash durations are super quick, and high-speed sync is even better in many regards.


The way that high-speed sync works is basically that the camera fires many many bursts in nearly instant succession. This allows a very brief shutter speed to still be evenly illuminated through flash, the main downside is a loss of power due to the quick bursts.


Syl Arena has a nice post somewhat explaining this working in he opposite direction of you. He is trying to shoot at super high speeds to freeze action, which inherently lets him underexpose the ambient while illuminating his subject correctly. Mind you, his setup may be a tad out of many of our reach... still an interesting read.


Check it out!

[greggf]

You could be right. I only use Shoe mount flashes right now(several 580ll"s), with umbrellas and either a mounted 580exll on the camera, or an STe-2. When using hi-speed sync, the flash lets out multiple pulses to cover the duration of the shutter. So, you don't have to use full power of the slaves because of that. Plus you can always adjust your shutter speed to compensate. I haven't had any problems as far as triggering goes, as I'm usually pretty close to the subject, or I have the flashes turned to capture the pulse. I try to use the sun or existing light with fill from the flashes to overcome shadows. Of course, avoiding high noon or later bright light(ruins everything!!). Here is an example...and this was just a 580exll on camera with a sto-fen diffuser, sun at camera left at 7 o'clock....


MarkIV, 16-35ll, iso 100 2.8@1/1600th


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[Keith B]

You could be right. I only use Shoe mount flashes right now(several 580ll"s), with umbrellas and either a mounted 580exll on the camera, or an STe-2. When using hi-speed sync, the flash lets out multiple pulses to cover the duration of the shutter. So, you don't have to use full power of the slaves because of that. Plus you can always adjust your shutter speed to compensate. I haven't had any problems as far as triggering goes, as I'm usually pretty close to the subject, or I have the flashes turned to capture the pulse.

I only use an ST-E2 to fire my flashes. I have heard so many people slam the ST-E2. I have only ever had one issue that was easily fixed, once when I was shooting the sun was beaming directly into the IR receiver on the flash keeping it from firing. So I set up a flag and it was done.


This shot was done with two 580EXIIs, ST-E2 out side with no problems.


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