Shooting with speedlight flash - technique

I was taking pictures at a friends wedding the other weekend, and I noticed in a few of my pictures I actually have their wedding photographer in the frame. I noticed how they were shooting indoors at the reception, take a look....

I was using my 430EX and the room was very large, with high ceilings, and dark walls, the bouncing was not working so I aimed the flash about 45 degrees upward. The wedding photographer shot like this all night (see first 2 pics below), with the flash positioned 180 degrees behind, is this what I should of done?

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Were they using off camera flash? It looks like they were using the on camera flash to trigger some slaves.

No slaves....

Bouncing behind you works great in the right situation. I usually do that if I can get away with it. I wouldn't have had that stofen thing on my flash when bounding though. The bounce card (last image) is a good idea in many cases though.

Have a look at this website. It does a better job explaining it than I ever could.
http://planetneil.com …h-photography-techniques/

Heres one for you....

She turned it to bounce in a specific situation, and forgot afterwards.

I have seen that happen.

In face, I may have done it once or twice!

She's using a 24-70 f/2.8L there... the AF assist beams on the 580 will make focusing a lot easier in dark lighting, mind you!

mattograph wrote in post #6276161
Heres one for you....

She turned it to bounce in a specific situation, and forgot afterwards.

I have seen that happen.

In face, I may have done it once or twice!

You must be a really sucky photog. I would never forget to turn my flash head in the right direction. And my wife has never made fun of me after freaking blinding myself with said flash head pointing straight into my eyes after forgetting to turn it when bouncing behind me.

DDCSD wrote in post #6276489
You must be a really sucky photog. I would never forget to turn my flash head in the right direction. And my wife has never made fun of me after freaking blinding myself with said flash head pointing straight into my eyes after forgetting to turn it when bouncing behind me.

Heh, did the same thing the other day. Thank goodness for my Chinese Omnibounce.



I often shoot backwards like that. It makes the light bounce all over the room and then back to the subject, taking away (most) flash shadows. Works well in certain situations. For example, I was practising with my flash photographing my son. We were in a lift (elevator). The lift had metal (not shiny) walls. So I bounced behind me, causing the light to scatter around the lift. Worked really well.

i shoot with my flash like that about 80% of the time,
gives awesome fill when your shooting in M @ -2/3 on ETTL

the light comes out so natural and soft

heres two examples

I use it that way sometimes. Depends, of course. On so many things, it just isn't worth getting into it

Did you happen to notice whether she had any kind of hand-held card/reflector?

Regarding this - how many milliseconds was she quicker then you?

DDCSD wrote in post #6276489
You must be a really sucky photog. I would never forget to turn my flash head in the right direction. And my wife has never made fun of me after freaking blinding myself with said flash head pointing straight into my eyes after forgetting to turn it when bouncing behind me.

I have never blinded myself -- my head is too short.

You must have a large mellon!

i bounce behind all the time. its a totally legit technique. if head straight forward is 0 degrees, and straight back is 180 degrees, most often i bounce at 135 degrees, back/left or back/right. this will give you modeling in the subject, broad/short light depending on the situation. looks like off camera flash if done correctly.

shoot at 1600 and a large aperture and you typically will get plenty of light.

eek! I would be afraid to shoot at 1600 with a flash. Thanks for the responses, are you sure she is shooting with a 24-70 F2.8? I don't think my 430EX has enough throw to shoot with it turned at 180, maybe it's time to upgrade!

i usually meter to -2/3 stop (generally iso 800-1600) and shoot at f2 on one of my primes with the 580ex just giving a little fill, bouncing it to the side gives more dimension to the fill light instead of a flat fill

430ex is more than powerful enough, you only use a little bit of the flashes power and use lots of iso and large apertures to get lots of ambient light in the shot

davo_robbo wrote in post #6278581
i usually meter to -2/3 stop (generally iso 800-1600) and shoot at f2 on one of my primes with the 580ex just giving a little fill, bouncing it to the side gives more dimension to the fill light instead of a flat fill

430ex is more than powerful enough, you only use a little bit of the flashes power and use lots of iso and large apertures to get lots of ambient light in the shot

Dave, your shots look awesome, btw.

Are you using auto white balance for these shots? I ask, since when I have tried this under fluorescents, I have picked up colors from the walls, plus with the green light -- wb nightmare!