Advice needed for basic night event shooting

[cmcm789]

Hi, I have offered to take some photos at a local christmas/ santa meet and greet event where my wife works. The photos are only as a record for the families, it's not paid and being done as a favour and basically their only other alternative is someone with an Ipad. But still I want to do my best for them.

From what i have been told there will be up to 50/60 families coming through to see santa arrive, have a bbq, take part in some activities and then meet santa. It will be night time and I will get a look at the event the eventing before.

So, I'm guessing i will being shooting outside in the dark (only lights from the house) as santa arrives (on a tractor i think?), shooting some candid (unposed) type shots outside as the children do activities and then inside taking photos of families with Santa inside (bell tent/ tee pee with christmas lights).

Kit:
Camera: Canon RP
Lens: Canon 50 f1.8, Tamron 17-35 (f2.8-4.0), Canon RF 24-105 (f4.5-7.1)
Flash: Godox TT350 (TTL) TT600 (Non TTL), flash bender, soft box, umbrella's and stands.

Priority is to capture the moments with as little fuss/stress (for me) as possible. So i want to try and get a default set up which will give me the best possible outcome (most keepers) and was thinking along the lines of:

Outside:
Crank up the ISO and use the 50mm f1.8 wide open where the light is ok to get some candid shots or detail shots. Where the light isn't suitable, the 17-35mm wide open with the TT350 set on TTL. Expose for the ambient to get the christmas lights ect in and let the flash get the subjects. I'm guessing i'll have to dial in some -ve Flash Exposure where it's dark. From searching online thinking of Using Av mode and shutter speed on slow sync (30sec - 1/180)?

How close is too close for shooting say a family of 4 when using the camera mounted flash and flash bender (9x9inch white reflector on top). Don't want to create lots of highlights in the centre. If i shoot at 35mm from about 3m i can get a 3m wide by 2m high frame.

Inside:
I could remove the TT350 and put the trigger on, have the TT600 on a stand and bounce of the inside of the tent (don't want to fuss with sofbox/umbrellas) to illuminate the family shots? I only want some fill light so i get the fairy lights and atmosphere. I also have CTO gels which i could use if needed.


Apologies for the long winded post, I'm not a flash photographer and have only used them (rarely) on stands before. Grateful for any advice or corrections if anything i have said above is completely wrong.

TIA

Colm

 

[CharleyL]

Crank up the ISO. Set the camera to "Auto ISO" but with a limit set to about 2 stops from it's maximum capability. This will help to prevent grainy photos from excessively high ISO. A Godox TT600 isn't a lot of light, but should do well to light their faces, if you can spread the light well,. Bouncing the light off the tent might work if the reflected light is enough to illuminate their faces. Placing a large scrim (the translucent part of a large 5 way reflector) on a light stand with the TT600 several feet behind the scrim will produce a large soft light source without reflecting it, and probably better for this than the tent, to illuminate their front sides. If the speedlite is set and placed properly behind the scrim, probably on another stand. It should illuminate the entire scrim, so your light source is the size of the scrim. If you can group two TT600 speedlites together for this it would be better. With the rest of the decorations farther away and so little available flash, I think you will get the effect that you want after a few "test shots" of shutter speed, and F-Stop adjustments. Most of the time a shutter speed of 1/60 will work fine with "posed photos".

Charley