Newbie G2 indoor photgraphy question

Forgive me if this is a silly question, but I am new and far from being a photographer by trade or hobby. I am in fact a kitchen and bath re-modeler and have been using my Canon G2 to take pictures of my work.

I have a wide angel lens and have used it with and without the flash after finding out the flash leaves a shadow in the corner when using a wide lens. So my problem is how to I correct the light without a flash and still take a full picture with a wide lens? I always leave my camera on auto. I don't know much about all the settings.

I know I am looking for a short answer, but any help pr guidance would be greatly appreciated. I have been looking on Ebay for a light stand with umbrella thinking that may be what I need, but I'm clueless.

Thanks!
T.J.

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Welcome to the forum!
Very nice work, btw--I'm a photographer and a woodworker by hobby, which means I'm slow and imperfect at both Just finished building a built-in buffet out of red oak, and it took forever!

Several lighting options:
Get an external flash (ebay is a good option), which will not be blocked by the lens.

Use the internal flash with a reflector/diffuser to bounce the flash up and out.
Commercial option:
https://photography-on-the.net …18&highlight=di​fuser+clip
Search here for diffuser (or 'difuser' a common spelling) for various homemade variants. My personal favorite is to hold a white 3x5 card in front of the flash at an angle. Works great--easy on the wallet.

An external light rig, like you were thinking is also an option. That will probably give you the most light. An external flash should be sufficient at the distances you're working with, however. And the internal flash may even be up to it--I'd start there.

If you don't mind, I would like to add a few thoughts to what dbump has already provided.

First - take careful note of the different coloring of your two shots. The shot without the flash is much warmer, more yellow-orange in all of the white areas. This is due to the fact that the predominant ambient light in the room is artificial (probably tungsten) from the under the cabinet lights (they would have looked greenish had they been fluorescent, unless the fluorescent bulbs are the special bulbs that produce a warmer light.

In order to get the best shot under those conditions, you may want to set your camera's White Balance setting for the indoor Tungsten setting. It would also be worth considering a custom White Balance setting based on a White Card. Your User Guide, pages 70 - 72 will give the detailed procedure for doing that.

Since you are not taking photos of anything moving, and probably don't need the expense and learning curve of a sophisticated lighting setup, why not just use a tripod to cope with the long exposure time needed by the ambient light?

Use the time delay feature to avoid camera shake, set the white balance, as has been suggested above, to the type of lighting available, use a small aperture get max depth of field, and you will usually get good results.

It would also be beneficial to shoot in RAW, that way you will have more control in your white balance. Also, bracket like crazy, that is, with your camera on a tripod, to take several exposures of the exact same scene. You may find that those pictures that look really underexposed may hold the best details which can be brought out in post processing. Bracketing allows you to pick the best image, or even merge the best of two images. For example, in the second pic where you have the window, you can select a picture that has good exposure for the inside, and another one that was exposed well for the outside. You can merge both these pictures to get a pretty neat image that shows a well lit inside, plus the garden (or whatever it is) outside instead of a blown highlight.
If you want to give the feeling of spaciousness, shoot from a low angle to make the ceilings appear tall.
Be wary of reflections, such as that on the table. Move the camera to prevent this.
Try to hide the wires of the appliances, they mess up the photo.
I see you have a lot of light fixtures there, it would be a good idea to turn it on. The warm sources of light will give a nice effect.
Get a flower arrangement, it spices up the scene. Don't get one that's too tall though, it will make the room appear smaller.
I love taking interior shots. I have a friend who is a real estate agent and when she has an expensive listing she hires me to take pictures. These are some of the tricks i have learned...