Strobing in daylight in a field?

Hi,

I Have seen quite a few shots where the photographer had used a polarizing filter in sunlight with a flash and got that mazing strobing effect of darkened background, great saturation and a real pop to the picture.

How is that achieved??? Do you under expose for the flash??? I tried something similar in a field of yellow flowers and no matter what i got terrible results...under exposed, over exposed, no popping.

What am i doing wrong????

This is what I have heard and will be trying when I get my flashgun.

The shutter speed controls the ambient. f/stop controls the intensity of the flash. (Assuming your working in manual! If you are using a built-in flash or using ttl this will not work)

In order to find out the right exposure you use your flash's "Guide Number" This guide number will enable you to figure out the correct exposure for the flash. The equation is = Guide number divided by distance equals f/stop. From there you dial in your aperture you have calculated and the correct shutter speed. To underexpose the ambient you need to increase your shutterspeed.

The flashes exposure isn't affected by the shutterspeed because it fires at a much higher rate than the shutterspeed.

A neutral density filter may be required if shooting in bright daylight.

Oh i see...eh? what? lol

Looks like as a newbie to flash i need to learn considerably more lol.

Thanks for the reply though if anything stands out blatantly it is i dont know what i am doing lol.

Just experiment. I can't wait until I get my flashgun/s so I can experiment

it is achieved by first figuring out what "manual" settings you will need to make the daylight dark enough to match what you are trying to do, it's easier on a cloudy day of course. Then taking your flash and cranking up the power, it's a lot easier to do this with stuff like pocketwizards newer control system that allows for faster sync speeds.

Keep in mind that if you are just using the speedlite on camera or even with a radio trigger you will often only be able to get a sync of 1/200 max for most speedlite, sometimes less. Also you need to know the max sync speed of your camera. T2i which is what it looks like you have is 1/250th. Also the max sync speed of the trigger you use as well.

So in this case you will probably want to max out your shutter to 1/200th (if the trigger and speedlite can get there) and then adjust the f/ until you get the desired ambient look, then setup the flash and see if you can get enough power out of it to light your subject.

That's how I typically go about it. I also use an Einstein strobe so I have plenty of power to make the sun look like a candle in the distance.

BoneJj has it - thats exactly what I do too.

For example:

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PCJ that is exactly what I am trying to achieve! That is a great pic

You don't need a polarizer to do this, just a flash. Under expose the ambient using shutter speed and control the subject with flash power and aperture.

Check out these blogs for more details:
- Strobist.com
- Neil v. Tangents blog
- Zack Arias

I was about to post about this same topic. Lets say your exposure is 1/200 and f/13 to get this effect. But if I wanted to narrow my depth of field, would I just use a ND filter? Or would Highspeed sync be a better option?

Keep in mind you have two seperate exposures that you are balancing. The first is the ambient, and to achieve the saturation you want you need to underexpose the bright sunlight a bit. So take your camera in M mode and chimp until you get the ambient saturation you want. However you have to make sure that your shutter speed is within max sync speed range (under 1/250). If not adjust the aperture or ISO or both until you get what you want.

If you are using a speedlite with ETTL, the just turn it on and fire away. But if are using manual flash, then you need to turn the flash on and adjust the flash power to match the aperture you already have.

From there if you need to adjust you can brighten the ambient by using a longer shutter speed, or darken by using a faster shutter speed if you can still maintain sync.

Oddly enough, I blogged about this the other day:

http://mfphotographybl​og.ca …ash-to-overpower-the-sun/

edge100 wrote in post #12291141
Oddly enough, I blogged about this the other day:

http://mfphotographybl​og.ca …ash-to-overpower-the-sun/

Don't understand something, your flash has not enough power for letting you match sun's exposure at given subject distance (f16 in your example) but same flash has power to beat the sun by two stops when using HSS mode?

Going into HSS mode alone will make you loose 2 & 1/2 to 3 stops then for each every one stop of increase in ss you loose one stop of flash power. I know you gain back this one stop as you use wider aperture. But for ambient/flash ratio how does using HSS mode get you two stops over ambient?

dmbpettit wrote in post #12291066
I was about to post about this same topic. Lets say your exposure is 1/200 and f/13 to get this effect. But if I wanted to narrow my depth of field, would I just use a ND filter? Or would Highspeed sync be a better option?

Exactly. If you want to narrow your f/ then you will need to either use an nd filter or consider forking out the cash for something like the pocket wizzard system that will get you the super fast shutter speed. Just remember that the 580ex II is not a happy camper with the HSS that the pa system makes it do, I think there is another brand that has models out that will let you sync at faster shutter speeds but I forget what it is.

ND filter can cost you less but they are also a little cumbersome as well, but if you calculate how many stops of light you want to come down right and get your ambient and flash power dialed in. You are golden.... put the right comb on there and you can get what ever f/ you want as long as you figure out what you need with the light you have.

dmbpettit wrote in post #12291066
I was about to post about this same topic. Lets say your exposure is 1/200 and f/13 to get this effect. But if I wanted to narrow my depth of field, would I just use a ND filter? Or would Highspeed sync be a better option?

Assuming you wanted to shoot at f/2.8, 4.5 stops will be difficult to achieve with shutter speed and HSS. And with ND filters you have to consider if your speedlite has enough power output to allow for such an exposure.

dmbpettit wrote in post #12291066
I was about to post about this same topic. Lets say your exposure is 1/200 and f/13 to get this effect. But if I wanted to narrow my depth of field, would I just use a ND filter? Or would Highspeed sync be a better option?

I think it's answered already - but you either need More Power (tm - ug ug ug) or less aperture (f5.6, f2.8)