Flash SETUP HELP diagram please

[rich_yau]

thx

[Headcase650]

Try here,
http://www.studiolighting.net/

[DaveG]

i have a 2 550 exes and 1 bracket. For a portrait how would i set them up[hold them]??? Are there any like lighting diagrams around i could look at?

You place one flash within 20 degrees of the camera position. This is the fill light. Then you place another flash to either side. Although you could put it anywhere, 45 degrees is as good as any for a portrait. In a classical portrait you would have the subject's face turned towards the Main light, so most of their face is lit by that flash.

If these were manual studio strobes I would suggest that you have the main light one stop brighter than the fill. That is a 3:1 lighting ratio and will result in a shot with detail in the shadows and a limited latitude that any film or digital capture will be able to handle.

If you are using two 550's you could use them on wireless manual (see your instruction book) or you could use them with the wireless TTL. The near camera fill flash is the Master and will default to Group A if you do nothing to it. Select Group B for the second 550 which in spite of being the Slaved flash is the Main light. Although this sounds ass backwards you need to select a 1:3 (not 3:1) ratio on the Master flash.

The details of setting up the 550 for ratio'd flash output is in your instruction book as well, but there will be NO reference to using just two flashes. The manual implies that you must use three flashes with the Master as more or less a dummy. Or you could use the ST-E2 as a projector. But you can use one 550 as a Master and one 550 (or a 420 which is what I use) as a Slave.

Having said all of that I don't particularly like to use my Wireless TTL system for formal portraits. I don't have manual control over my 420's so I must use E-TTL. That means that the camera is going to make exposure decisions about every shots that I take. These decisions are usually in the ballpark but there is a definite variation in exposure. If I was shooting a feature shot of someone I wouldn't care, since all that has to come out of a shoot like that is one out of fifty. But if I'm doing a series of portraits variation of exposure is going to give me a different density in the background and that will be a pain to fix later. In those cases I'll use manual strobes and a flash meter to insure consistency.

[scottbergerphoto]

Nicely said Dave.

[robertwgross]

I have only a little variation from what DaveG stated so eloquently.

I use the STE2 as a wireless master at the camera. Then I put one 550EX about three feet to the left of the camera, and up about a foot or two. Then I put the second 550EX about four feet to the right, and the same level as the camera. Sometimes I fool with the ratios, but on other times I will simply move the second 550EX backwards a foot or two, since it needs to be slightly dimmer than the main light.

---Bob Gross---