What went wrong

I had a shoot the other day. And the photos were all washed out because of the flash.

Location small room with the subject wearing a white shirt.

I was using a Canon Rebel D300, a Quantaray 9500 Flash on a handgrip(TTL module was used). I set the camaera to P mode using 100 asa and think the shutter speed was set to 200 being the max sync speed for that camera. Half of the photos where the flash was used were over exposed. I had other things going on so I didn't think to chimp after a couple of shots and time was short for the sequence whole event was over in a few minutes less than 5 I think. I was able to get around 30-40 frames in that time.about 90% were not blured or the subject was not good.

I thought that the ttl would have regulated the flash to prevent over exposure. and yes I verified the module was in ttl mode.

I have Photoshop CS-CS3 Beta and I am looking for a tutorial that covers take two copies of a photo exposing one for the shadows and the other for the highlights and merging them to get one shows the correct expoures for the photo. Can anyone point me to it. I had seen it somewhere but can not remember where I saw it.

My view on flashes has been that using the OEM models is the best bet, because of the level of electronic communication that needs to go on between them. That said, the problem you're having is that the camera/flash are firing too powerfully-- in order to fix that you need to dial in flash exposure compensation. I believe that a hacked dRebel has that capacity, but I of course am not familar with your situation in that regard. The flash might have the ability to dial in comp. as well, read your manual.

You may need to simply shoot the flash in manual mode, establishing the needed exposure at the outset of shooting.

I had this same problem.

All i know is you need to learn about exposure compensation.

Im not sure what it is yet (i still need to read up on it too) but when i was shooing in manual mode even with TTL i was getting over exposed shots as i was not setting an exposure compensation.

If you search that phrase it might help.

MagicallyDelicious wrote in post #2736559
I had this same problem.

All i know is you need to learn about exposure compensation.

Im not sure what it is yet (i still need to read up on it too) but when i was shooing in manual mode even with TTL i was getting over exposed shots as i was not setting an exposure compensation.

If you search that phrase it might help.

More specifically flash exposure compensation, or FEC. Exposure compensation (EC) isn't going to help with indoor flash photography.

Bob_A wrote in post #2736576
More specifically flash exposure compensation, or FEC. Exposure compensation (EC) isn't going to help with indoor flash photography.

see told you i knew nothing! i was half way there though!! haha

thankies

Blackey Cole wrote in post #2736499
I had a shoot the other day. And the photos were all washed out because of the flash.

Location small room with the subject wearing a white shirt.

I was using a Canon Rebel D300, a Quantaray 9500 Flash on a handgrip(TTL module was used). I set the camaera to P mode using 100 asa and think the shutter speed was set to 200 being the max sync speed for that camera. Half of the photos where the flash was used were over exposed. I had other things going on so I didn't think to chimp after a couple of shots and time was short for the sequence whole event was over in a few minutes less than 5 I think. I was able to get around 30-40 frames in that time.about 90% were not blured or the subject was not good.

I thought that the ttl would have regulated the flash to prevent over exposure. and yes I verified the module was in ttl mode.

I have Photoshop CS-CS3 Beta and I am looking for a tutorial that covers take two copies of a photo exposing one for the shadows and the other for the highlights and merging them to get one shows the correct expoures for the photo. Can anyone point me to it. I had seen it somewhere but can not remember where I saw it.

Do you know if your flash is compatible with Canon's E-TTL or E-TTL II? If it isn't, then it will not work automagically with your camera.

Note that to get proficient at using flash you need to understand that you are controlling two separate exposures, subject and ambient (or background). Until you get a grasp of that concept try the following recipe and see if you get more consistent results for indoor flash photography (ONLY WORKS IF YOUR FLASH IS CANON E-TTL or E-TTL II COMPATIBLE):

1. Set your camera to MANUAL
2. Set ISO to 200
3. Set aperture to f/5.6
4. Set shutterspeed to 1/200s
5. Set FEC (flash exposure compensation) to + 2/3 of a stop (NOT EC, but FEC!)

Fire away and see how it works. If you need a bit more or less exposure just adjust FEC +/- a bit. You'll probably always need it 0 or greater and less than + 1 1/3, with the average being around + 2/3.

FEC is definitely more important with indoor flash photography.

My hunch is that the TTL module you have for that flash only works with film cameras. Tell us more about where and when you bought the flash and module.

Yes the flash is compatable it uses modules to adapter to the different camera. I never had this problem before with it. NOrmally everything is perfect. It was just this once where it went haywire. I normally use a shutter speed of 1/60 when using the flash but had just learned of the camera's F-sync speed of 1/200 so I selected the P mode and set the speed to 1/200 so I would capure any movement without blurring. and you would think it would be dark er since the faster shutter speed but that didn't happen.

Ok two questions from the comments:

1) what is dRebel hacked? tell me more.

2) what is FEC? and hoiw to use it with ETTL? Tell me more and where I can find more information. That way I can practice before my next event.

When it comes to flash photography, "Flash Photography 101" and "The EOS Flash Bible" are mandatory readings! Just click on Curtis_N's links in his signature .

CKA