using fill flash?

hi when using fill flash, do you meter for the background first then dial in the settings (im trying manual cam settings). or do you just frame the shot and let the camera/flash do its trickery?
what i am wondering is....if the exposure is set to partial metering (9%)and the focal point is covering the subject (ie say a full frame potrait outside..say 60% subject and 40% grass/sky) how does one attain the correct ambient light exposure..hope this makes sense?
also does the same apply in indoor shots with fill flash (i know to set FEC first so that i dont get full blast on the subject..just a little confused on how to get the ambient light correct?
also if using av mode if you use partial metering how does the cam evaluate the ambient light? when the focus point is covered?
i had a look on the eos flash bible ..may need to re read it couldnt see these specifics covered

You can do it either way. Partial meter the background with the camera in manual mode and then recompose over the subject and take your picture.

If you want the camera to meter the background without recomposing, then obviously you can't use partial metering. The best choise, then, would be to use center-weighted average metering with some -EC, especially if the subject is fill a large part of the viewfinder, so that the bg isn't overexposed.

Depending on how you want to balance the ambient light and the flash light, you might also want to use some -FEC on the fill so that the fill light doesn't look too obvious and unnatural.

Let me see if I can convey this...
1. Read the Flash Stickies in the flash Forum.
2. Don't think about the metering mode for a moment. Just look at a scene, or situation (in your mind if you have to).
3. Drill in your brain that Canon's flash exposure metering, and ambient light camera exposure metering, are completely SEPARATE.
4. Now, think of your scene again. Is it a small person standing in a big dark event catering hall, or in front of a dark stone wall? A bird in a dark tree? Then just like with ambient metering, the flash metering sees this "scene" as underexposed, will pound out the E-TTL/II flash power, and undoubtedly ruin the shot with an over-exposed subject. So before you ever shoot, you dial in some negative FEC.
5. The opposite is also true.
6. I could rant on, but Canon E-TTL/II is a dark art. When doing outdoor, bright light fill, I like the "saturated" look I used to get with slides. So, today, in this shot, I metered and intentionally UNDEREXPOSED the ambient background by at least 2/3 to 1 stop, then turned on the flash, and popped it on the foreground person, from an Off Camera Shoe 2 cord, letting E-TTL do the work. To adjust exposure, I adjusted ISO:
http://aesop.rutgers.e​du …s/IPM_Fruit_Tie​tjen_3.htm

Without flash, his face was almost dark. The subject is not interesting to Forum members, but I really like the exposure this way.
7. One idea is to balance ambient and fill so the flash does not look so much like flash.
8. In really low indoor light, none of this works. You get a deer in the head lights look. There are limits to little hot shoe flash heads.
9. Again, read the stickies.
Jack

How about using also something like the Lumiquest minisoftbox or the like for fill in flash (keeping the exposure rules stated above, of course). It will help to make the fill in flash more natural, or I am going the wrong way ?

Cardboard index cards rubberbanded to flash head, Sto-fen diffuser, and Lumiquest are all decent small location approaches to avoiding harsh shadows (wrap-around light). Depending on the scene, sometimes they work, sometimes they don't.

Here's a shot where I used Lumiquest because I could not bounce the flash - no white walls, no white ceiling: http://aesop.rutgers.e​du …/ObroptaCumSale​mWater.htm

You can just see the shadows on the wall about half-way down, behind the chairs. Lumiquest works decent where there are no walls, but it struggles when shooting wide-angle lens close to subjects.
When using Lumiquest, I have success keeping camera in Manual Exposure Mode. Choosing an f/stop for depth of field.

Everything you want to know about different flash techniques

René Damkot wrote:
Everything you want to know about different flash techniques

That seems interesting, I forecast an afternoon reading...

thanks for the info guys i think ive got the fill flash ok outdoors seems well exposed and natural look to the photos (using -fec)
now the indoor shots are still troubling me(pub/bar type shots ie dark rooms head n shoulder shots)..if i set ss to between 60 and 250 and aperture to 8.0,iso 800(seen them settings on here somewhere so i thought id give em a whirl)the shots come out well exposed but look like theyre taken in a bright room..if i turn down fec the histogram swings right over to the left.ok i understand that and why that happens.
what i would like to know Is it possible in some way to give the appearence of a pub/bar ambience ? without lowering the speed to 'seconds' and risking blur either mine(hand holding or subject moving? yes i know the flash will stop movement but there will still be 'ghosting' and the flash will still lighten the area/walls as theyre sat close to the walls!
maybe im asking to much but if you dont ask you never find out?

Use ISO 1600, open up the aperture, lower shutterspeed to 1/30 (or whatever, according to light levels). Snap away