Need some technical lighting NOOB assistance

Trying some FIRST studio shots. These were just some test shots, nothing fancy, but already having some technical issues.

The setup: a 580EXII camera right connected via ETTL synch cord to a PW Mini on a 5D MKII
a 550EX connected to a PW FlexMini to camera left 135 degs.
Using ETTL with 580EXII in master ratio mode (I think it was set to 1:4 with 1 being the 580EXII)

Using a cheap black cloth background

EXIF: ISO 100 1/200 f/4.0 70mm

Problem- I am getting a huge amount of digital noise in most of my shots, and not sure why. It looks like I am shooting at ISO 3200, or severely underexposed and pushed it up in PP. The photo "appears" to be exposed properly, yet the noise is unbearable. Not sure if I am screwing something up with the camera (Set to Manual), or screwing up the lighting setup. Please help!!!! Any assistance appreciated. Two photos below are typical:

Both photos are untouched out of the camera (except for jpg conversion)

HTTP response: NOT FOUND | MIME changed to 'image/gif' | Redirected to error image by FLICKR

HTTP response: NOT FOUND | MIME changed to 'image/gif' | Redirected to error image by FLICKR

Check if ISO is set to AUTO.

I had that happen on a body a couple times.

I diconnected everything from the body and the batty and all was fine but I never did get to the bottom of the problem.

Camera was on manual, including ISO...

EXIF data above was the actual recorded.

I really think it was the evaluative metering on the ETTL Master Flash going haywire somehow. I had a small modeling light centered on the face with some light spilling onto the background. I think the ETTL flash metering tried to lightup the background. Another theory was that my rimlight was spilling light back into the lens and screwing it up.

I dont know, just scratching my head. I know there is probably a simple answer that is obvious to someone out there.

Anyone? Please??

Turn off all metering?

Any chance to try it out without Pocket Wizards?

I read some time ago about Cactus triggers affecting Canon 5D in a similar way, making top of the frame go noisy and full of odd patterns
http://www.fredmiranda​.com/forum/topic/75898​4 here you can read more about it, and even see a sample photo of the problem. or here http://www.flickr.com …603230295239/?s​earch=cmos

i dont see noise, but i am viewing on a netbook right now.

Thanks All----

Yup, next test shoot is tommorrow... and will be going full manual control on the speedlights for sure. No more of this ETTL nonsense for me, at least not in a studio.

Koka, that is a great find, the last shot posted is almost the SAME pattern I am seeing!! I know that the 580EXII can put out interference, but I had it mounted 3 ft away using a ETTL hot shoe cord. i DEFINITELY will be using losing the PW's tomorrow.

Question.... I know I can still fire the 580EXII manually using the ETTL hot shoe cable, but will the 550EX fire as a Canon Radio Slave?

Appreciate the responses so far, and hope to have some good news if I can get everything to fire in manual and without the PW's.

CosmoKid wrote in post #11755770
i dont see noise, but i am viewing on a netbook right now.

Cosmo: Perhaps I should have posted some of the worst effected shots, this aren't so obvious. Try zooming into the hair on the right (and left) side of the cheekbones of the face. The banding is quite apparent when zoomed and goes across both the subject and the background. I initially thought it was plain old sensor noise, but it does appear to have a banding pattern.

DanangMonkey wrote in post #11755995
Cosmo: Perhaps I should have posted some of the worst effected shots, this aren't so obvious. Try zooming into the hair on the right (and left) side of the cheekbones of the face. The banding is quite apparent when zoomed and goes across both the subject and the background. I initially thought it was plain old sensor noise, but it does appear to have a banding pattern.

I am viewing this right now from your Flickr page, and I don't see any digital noise either. I see that the flash power is high, but ETTL was supposed to fix that right?

Looks like you solved the issue?

http://www.flickr.com …406937219/in/ph​otostream/

Awesome portrait of a beautiful lady!

The noise in a gridded pattern is easy to see in the first image on the black backdrop. I didn't see it at first either but after looking at the backdrop more closely, it was easy to see the noise and the gridded pattern it makes. It looks like some form of electrical interference affecting the sensor.

Thanks for the Compliments SHank, will pass it on... Some of the shots were not effected, and in some I was able to tamp down the "noise" by lowering the shadow tones.... Alot of the shots were downright ruined, with the pattern crossing the hair or facial features. I boosted the flash power in these shots to eliminate the possibility that underexposure was causing the problem.

PacAce, glad that you can see this, thought I was going crazy or would need to post one of the more obvious shots. Any Guess as to the source? Obviously the MiniTT will be the first thing to be eliminated during my re-try. Another possible source that just dawned on me was the ETTL hot shoe cable. It was third party from FLashZebra. It got wound around the camera body several times when i was shooting, and wonder if the ETTL control signals are effecting the sensor?

DanangMonkey wrote in post #11756264
Thanks for the Compliments SHank, will pass it on... Some of the shots were not effected, and in some I was able to tamp down the "noise" by lowering the shadow tones.... Alot of the shots were downright ruined, with the pattern crossing the hair or facial features. I boosted the flash power in these shots to eliminate the possibility that underexposure was causing the problem.

PacAce, glad that you can see this, thought I was going crazy or would need to post one of the more obvious shots. Any Guess as to the source? Obviously the MiniTT will be the first thing to be eliminated during my re-try. Another possible source that just dawned on me was the ETTL hot shoe cable. It was third party from FLashZebra. It got wound around the camera body several times when i was shooting, and wonder if the ETTL control signals are effecting the sensor?

If the cable doesn't have a ground sheathing that encases the wires, it is possible that having it wound around the camera can cause the noise problem.

Did you use an external battery pack with the flash? If so, is it attached to the camera? That can cause noise problems, too.

I get that sometimes when using lightroom or ACR then I open it in canons DPP and its not there anymore. It could be the camera profile in your software is not handling it right.

How did you transfer the pictures into pc. For some reason sometimes when I use lightroom to transfer of camera cable, i have a bunch of images transfer with this type of noise. when I remove the cf card from the camera and transfer them thru card reader and using copy paste in my folder I have no problem.