I think Moose is largely correct for fill flash. Generally, you only
want to raise the shadows about 1 stop and that's certainly within the
range of a good digital. But the decision is not simple. Having to
adjust all the exposures may be a pain depending on how many there are.
Flash range is another big question. Something like the Vivitar 283 or
T-32 that didn't have zoom heads are probably maxed out in sunlight by
the time it gets 6-10 feet. Zoom heads can alter the equation but can't
solve the issue of Moose's last demo image which says "Oops! Real flash
on the girl." Since the girl is closer she's gonna get more light and a
lot of it. The inverse square law with respect to flash light is very
unforgiving. For an environment where you aren't in good control of the
subjects the shadow/highlight control is probably the best bet.
I've been meaning to do some more experimentation on this but keep
forgetting. Fill flash is never easy outside of a controlled
environment and it's possible to make serious exposure errors that are
hard to detect on the LCD. But if the camera offers one stop of shadow
detail via shadow/highlight it may be the safest and most effective
course for many situations.
Dr. (sometimes) Flash
Moose wrote:
> Bob Whitmire wrote:
>> Every year my village of Round Pond holds a Fourth of July parade ..., it's
>> quite a day.
>>
>> www.bwp33.com
>>
>> ... This is not my usual cuppa, and the sun actually showed itself for the
>> first time in more than a month about twenty minutes before the parade
>> started.
>
> Nice documentation of the event. WooHoo, though should have been framed
> to include all the gams. :-)
>
>> Gonna have to get me a fancy fill flash, for sure.
>>
>
> I'm not convinced about that. In light that bright, with those subjects,
> I imagine any mid power flash would often not be close enough to have
> much effect. Then there's the problem of flash and closer objects. With
> manual, it could overlight them, pulling focus away from the primary
> subject. With on flash Auto, the close brightness would quench the flash
> too early for the intended subject.
> <http://www.moosemystic.net/Gallery/Others/Whitmire/RPond4th.htm>
>
> I wouldn't necessarily propose exactly what I've done in this example.
> With an original size, 16 bit image, a more subtle effect could be
> achieved. And the amount of fill is a matter of taste. Perhaps another
> reason to opt for PP fill?
>
> In any case, with a low noise camera like the D3 in bright light, there
> should be almost endless shadow detail available to pull up as desired.
> You'd be amazed what a nice dose of combined Shadow & Highlight would do
> for all these images.
>
> Dr. Eschew Flash
>
--
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