Still struggling with Speed Lights

I am not sure what I am missing here but I am having a heck of a time wrapping my mind around speed lights.

I am shooting a 5Diii with a 600EX light. With one of those white socks made for diffusion.

I was just messing around shooting my son and my nephew. They were on a couch about 10' away.

I was in aperture priority with ISO set to Auto. I tried both evaluative and average metering. In both cases the image was underexposed.

I tried dialing FEC to +1, +2, and +3 none of which seemed to make much of a difference?

I finally gave up and took control back over the ISO and ramped it up to 800. Fixed the exposure issue. If was as if the flash did not have enough power to handle the shot. The two things I don't get with that is why wouldn't the flash have enough power? It doesn't seem like that tough a shot and why didn't the camera ramp up the ISO automatically?

Forgot to mention that the walls are a mid brown color and the room is reasonably well lit with LED recessed lighting

I typically shoot manual but I figured shooting aperture priority would allow the camera to adjust to varying lighting conditions.

Can't for the life of me figure out what I am doing wrong!

Can you post samples? Were you shooting in E-TTL mode or manual mode on the flash? If Manual, what settings?

According to the manual, Auto ISO is fixed at ISO 400 with flash except in full auto or P. Depending on the aperture you set, there may not have been enough flash power (especially with a diffuser attached) to properly expose the scene, even with positive FEC. Having an acceptable exposure at ISO 800 makes me think the flash was maxed at ISO 400 and that still wasn't enough light.

Aperture priority is an odd beast with on camera flash.

There is a link here https://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthre​ad.php?t=138907 that talks about Av mode and flash.

Edit: Oops. I didn't realize that link was nearly ten years old. The camera and flash are doing what they are supposed to do. It only wants to provide a bit of fill. Give it a shot in manual, and i think you will see more what you expect. Here's another great source, if you haven't already checked it out.

http://learn.usa.canon​.com

Also explain what this sock thing is on the end of your flash.

I was shooting in ETTL

Ok. I did not realize that the ISO was maxed at 400. It was shooting at ISO 400 which was aggravating the crap out of me because I didn't understand why it was not increasing ISO.

He's Gone - Are you suggesting both camera and flash in manual or camera in manual, expose for the scene and flash in ETTL for fill? I am trying to picture what that would look like in a building.
I am going to have to play around with that some tomorrow.

I have watched a bunch of videos on lighting and I can do OK with my Elinchrom RX600's but for some reason the speedlights are still getting the best of me.

hes gone wrote in post #16846488
=he's gone;16846488]Aperture priority is an odd beast with on camera flash.

There is a link here https://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthre​ad.php?t=138907 that talks about Av mode and flash.

Edit: Oops. I didn't realize that link was nearly ten years old. The camera and flash are doing what they are supposed to do. It only wants to provide a bit of fill. Give it a shot in manual, and i think you will see more what you expect. Here's another great source, if you haven't already checked it out.

http://learn.usa.canon​.com

Also explain what this sock thing is on the end of your flash.

I was wondering the same...

The sock is a store bought diffuser. Bonnet might be better than sock.

Northwoods Bill wrote in post #16847269
The sock is a store bought diffuser. Bonnet might be better than sock.

Can you show is a picture of this sock?

Maybe something like this? This is as close to a flash "sock" as I could find.

http://www.aliexpress.​com …Ora4IW67r0CFUVp​7Aodzj0AwQ

Flash in Av mode is indeed a funny beast.

Although this won't sound right (but it's true): shooting in Manual mode on your camera with the flash in ETTL mode is about as easy as it gets...

In M mode... Set your aperture to get your desired DOF, select a shutter fast enough to hand hold for your focal length (1/60 to 1/200), ISO to 400 (it may be set for you), shoot away.

The thing that people can't get their heads around (including me for the longest time) is that these settings are probably no where near proper exposure, but that's the job of ETTL flash - to compensate and light up your subjects so they look properly exposed. Of course, the more extreme your settings are away from what would be proper exposure settings, the more power the flash has to deliver and the more artificial the lighting will start to look (dark backgrounds etc.) so don't expect f11 at 1/200 to look great indoors at night. But f4 at 1/100 will probably look pretty natural.

If you're not happy with the result (flash appears too harsh or to soft) change the flash exposure compensation (+/-) to taste... Easiest using the buttons and wheel on the back of the flash.

Edit: oh, and bounce the flash off the ceiling for best effect.

Finally found the sock on page 27 of Adorama's flash accessories.

http://www.adorama.com​/FASS.html

Virtual Rain I will try the manual / ETTL technique. Thanks!

I find that during the day when I only want flash as fill, leaving the camera in AV mode and the flash in ETTL works really well.

At nighttime or in dark indoor settings, when flash is the main light source, I set the camera to manual and the flash to ETTL. Then as explained above, set the aperture for your desired DOF, shutter speed based on various things including how much ambient you want to let in; if your subjects are still or not; need to stop camera shake at the relevant focal length; and whether you're using HSS (which can sometimes be very useful in allowing you to go above 1/200th but will eat up significantly more battery power).

For ISO settings I think mainly about how much ambient would look good in the photo (higher ISO = more ambient - so for example if there are fairy lights at a party, or candlelight, more ambient is nice); and minimising the disturbance of a brighter flash for my subjects.

Then hit the shutter button and let ETTL work out how much flash is needed to properly light the scene.

There are purists who will say your flash should be in manual as well as the camera, which is great if you're in a studio or other controlled environment with time to experiment.. or a seasoned pro with years of experience and an instinctive understanding of flash exposure settings. But ETTL is a good practical choice for the rest of us especially where things are happening fast, your subjects are moving around and you need to think about other things than manual flash settings.

As Virtual Rain said, bouncing flash is a very useful technique. This link contains a huge amount of helpful information on bouncing and flash generally:

http://neilvn.com/tang​ents/

Northwoods Bill wrote in post #16847675
Finally found the sock on page 27 of Adorama's flash accessories.

http://www.adorama.com​/FASS.html

Virtual Rain I will try the manual / ETTL technique. Thanks!

Yup, looks like a sock. Lol

The idea behind modifying a flash is to increase the apparent size of the source of light from the perspective of the subject. From across a room, especially one with dark walls, that sock does almost nothing to increase the size of the light source. All it is doing is scattering light in all directions, forcing the flash to work harder. If you were in a smaller room with white walls you might see some benefit from light bouncing off walls but it would be negligible. A direct bounce off the ceiling or combination of the ceiling and walls would provide a much, much bigger light source.

The posts above have given good advice on Av and manual mode. Not sure if it was mentioned to under expose a bit in manual mode and ETTL. Some folks do this to darken the background and let the flash make the subject pop.

Take that "sock" off of the flash, go to manual mode(on the camera) and point the flash directly at the subject or bounce it off of a nearby wall or strategically placed reflector and you should see a marked improvement.

Oh and throw that "sock" in a nearby trashcan.