Is fill always so inconsistant?

Ok.. I'm frustrated. I was in a rather unexpected situation of having to use the flash (580 EX II ). I primarily do horse events outdoors. It was a dark covered arena w/really bright back light (really lousy light for action shots) .. so I used this opportunity to take some portrait shots of the 4H kids with their horses. ... .. anyway, I remember others here saying something about using AV. (I usually shoot on manual because it's consistant).

I shot on AV for awhile (ETTL) ... but the exposure seemed VERY inconsistant. The shots below are straight out of the camera. (I was able to correct them to put online) The next day, I tried shooting on P ... but the hard shadows were atrocious! (btw: images below are cropped tight for detail.. for this post)

So.. my question is: Is your fill flash always so inconsistant??.... Or what is it that I need to do under these lighting conditions.
(btw/I couldn't find my flash manual when I realized I needed to try this.. *sigh* .. so I'm not completely sure what I'm doing)

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I think you're better off sticking to M and then decide how the flash will determine exposure. You can let it ETTL or with the EX2 you can set it to thyristor mode so it detects the light coming back to the flash and doesn't use the camera's TTL. You can also change it from evaluative to average metering and see if that works better for you... but deciding on your manual exposure settings depending on the background luminance and then having the flash fill in the difference is usually the best approach.

However the biggest difference with those two shots appears to be auto white balance and not necessarily exposure. While the shutter speed changed, it looks like the flash adjusted output accordingly. Obviously you would've gotten better backgrounds by choosing a faster shutter or closing down the aperture a bit (the left one is closer than the right).

Metering (ambient in this case) was thrown off by the dark clothing in the second. So the shutterspeed is a stop higher. That's the main reason the image is brighter.
ETTL is also notorious for being fooled by white clothing or reflective surfaces, so the fill flash is also less in #1.

The WB is also quite a bit off on both (greenish cast in #1, yellow in #2).

I'd use manual for this if lighting is fairly constant (which I assume it is, since it looks like you are under a roof.) Also, I'd *not* use AWB, unless maybe when shooting Raw.

Get to know your equipment. This is 98% user error.

Playm wrote in post #5657857
I remember others here saying something about using AV. (I usually shoot on manual because it's consistant).

That was your first mistake.

Rene is correct. The white blouse vs. black jacket affected both the ambient and flash exposures. Shooting on M gives you greater control of the ambient, and you'll need to learn to adjust FEC for changing subject luminance.

Notice how the outdoor ambient is blown out in both images. In M mode, you could have metered on the background, adjusted to expose it correctly and then let the flash take care of your subjects.

I'll do a "me too" on this. I think your fill was doing its job just fine on both, but the second one had the ambient exposure seriously influenced by the black jacket. Since ETTL seems to expose for the lightest objects in the frame, I suspect that it wasn't influenced by the dark jacket. Because the camera was letting plenty of light in, the face was strongly lit by ambient light and very little flash was needed. The flash was simply refusing to over expose the white blaze on the horse's face. I suspect this phenomenon is what influenced the white balance in the second image as well. When using flash for fill, I presume that the camera balances for the flash rather than ambient (people don't want blue-looking fill most of the time), but since it had a rather large amount of orange light reflected by the earth or sawdust floor and didn't need very much fill at all, the relatively large amount of ambient light actually recorded its orange color. Had you used no fill at all, the second picture would probably have been much closer to normal looking. And, had you used manual exposure that didn't change, you would have gotten normal looking colors because the flash would have contributed more to the exposure.

Sometimes it's hard to out think these darned cameras.

Thanks for all of the suggestions and things to think about. This was a spontaneous thing - to shoot the portraits. I never set the WB on Auto.. BUT, even with that being said; this arena was "the lighting from he-ll". (AFTERward, I found out that they can't get any photographers to shoot horse shows in there... at least not for long). The skylights tend to send a red cast over everything... and then when they turned on the overhead lights, it added green areas. .. combined with the ambient lights.. it was a nightmare... so I thought I'd try the flash. (is that now 4 sources of light?? LOL) I think I might have tried a 'daylight WB'.. then switched to 'flash'..

I had my exposure set on spot (guess I never changed it from the event shots I'd been shooting).. so yes, I see what everyone is saying re; white shirt/black jacket.

My dh just found a manual online.. so that ought to help (along with the info from all of you) in the future. I'll get this figured out because it's good to know in case I need it again. .. It seems like I get into trouble any time I use auto anything.

I was a studio photographer 30+ yrs ago but only recently got a dslr (to shoot horses for a book I'm writing).. and then I got roped into shooting the season shows for the cutting club (horse events) that I use to ride with. .. so I haven't had much time to fiddle around with the flash. All of YOUR help is greatly appreciated.

You can see the mess I made with the flash here: http://shootmypix.com/​f511039118/
(hey, at least it was an opportunity to start using the flash to see what I need to learn to improve, eh? ... especially since I was shooting this 4H event as a favor for a friend)

Thanks again. I'll get out there and try some of those ideas this week.

Without a flash, try this + M & metering mode doesn't matter: Need an exposure crutch?

With flash, M + standardizing distance helps. See post #3
Tips for Xmas Ball Please

Curtis, Leo, Robert and others have helped me a bunch as I have had the same problem.

What I do is shoot M - pick the aperture (usually 5.6), then select the SS so that the background is 1/3 to 1/2 stop under exposed. Set the Flash to E-TTL and shoot away.

Here is what happened last Sunday when I went from indoor dark to outdoors bright and forgot to meter the background. I still had the SS at 1/250 from inside (I wanted the flash to completely light the subject indoors):

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Good example!

I agree.. great visuals!

Ok.. I'm really greatful for all of these great suggestions. I haven't tried everything yet (I will though) .. and didn't have a bride in white - so I grabbed what I had available. .. I feel relieved already being able to shoot on manual .. but already see better backgrounds and consistancy. .. this is what I did a few minutes ago. (sorry I didn't reply sooner.. but I had work to do)

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