Ok, first question.....flash

[mommytomjm]

My daughter's wheelchair has a canopy over it the majority of the time. I am finding her face in shadows all the time. I can lighten it up post picture, but I wonder if there is a setting that will help with this when actually taking the photo. (keep in mind I am totally new and don't understand f thingies, ISO, aperatures, etc.....so as much detail as possible would be good.)


Here's an indoor one.


Here's an outdoor one.

Thanks in advance.

[Jon]

Maybe get a white liner for the canopy? The usual procedure would be to set a reflector off to one side to bounce some of the light into her face. Rather awkward unless you've got someone who can stand around holding it. If you leave flash always on, you may get better results too, at the expense of some battery life (just carry two sets of spares rather than one, in that case).

[MaxZoom]

Flash on all the time is a good starting point.
I don't understand why flash was not used for the indoor shot? Some people react badly to flash, would using the flash all the time be a problem?
So the flash does not become too dominant use fill-in flash setting - its called different things on different cameras.
For the indoor shot it would have filled in the shadow areas a fair amount. Outdoors and against the light you might not notice the effect much but will reduce the noise when you try to photoshop up the face in shadow.
Using the flash will drain the batteries quickly but you will get better shots.
Dont' worry about the flash being too harsh a light source, its better to have a harsh light than no light at all.