Indoor Haloween Party - What Settings Are Best?

Hi guys,

I'm off to an indoor kiddies haloween party in a bit. As stated, it's indoor and the light will just be normal daylight. All the kiddies will probably be dressed in costumes but apart from that, nothing else to think about from that side of things.

I have a Canon 450D, 18-55 kit lens and also if needed, a Canon 430EX speedlite flash.

Could you guys please give me some advice on the best settings to go with to get the most accurate and clear shots out of this.

I always get all scared and go with auto or P but wanted some better advice?

Thanks very much

Ian

WIth the kit lens you will want to shot wide open and to stop any action, remember kids don't sit still, shot at least 1/250th. You could drop to 1/60th if it is static picture. WIth all this you will probably need to push your ISO to something like 1600 to use the higher shutter speeds. I'd shoot Raw to make color correction, as well as exposure adjustments, easier, if you shot jpeg you will need to set your white balance for what ever the mix of light is. There is nothing wrong with shooting Automatic or Program, you just need to know how to drive the camera with the exposure compensation. Now if you can get your ambient exposures dead on you could use the on board, but be careful, underexpose the ambient too much and ugly shadows result, overexpose and everything gets blown out.

Jack

Hi Jack,
Thanks very much for your reply. I did see it before I set off so "hopefully" it was of much use.
Just about to load up the pics and process them so i'll see.
Again, thanks