flash lighting

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nelly3164

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Neil
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hi everyone, i am new to the fascinating art of photography and i am having a problem with a new lighting/flash setup. the wife has bought me 2 flash/lighting heads, stands, and 1 shoot through brolly and a reflector brolly for xmas. i had to have a play and set up 1 of the heads with the reflector brolly and took a couple of shots on my fuji s1 pro, but the pictures were just about totally white with a small amount of the subject in the center, i used the flash on the camera to fire the flash head, and i cant figure out whats wrong. any ideas?. the camera was set on auto.
 
nelly3164 said:
hi everyone, i am new to the fascinating art of photography and i am having a problem with a new lighting/flash setup. the wife has bought me 2 flash/lighting heads, stands, and 1 shoot through brolly and a reflector brolly for xmas. i had to have a play and set up 1 of the heads with the reflector brolly and took a couple of shots on my fuji s1 pro, but the pictures were just about totally white with a small amount of the subject in the center, i used the flash on the camera to fire the flash head, and i cant figure out whats wrong. any ideas?. the camera was set on auto.
Click to expand...

If the camera is on auto maybe it doesnt take into account the studio flash and so it exposes for the subject with onboard flash but then you add an additional studio flash making it overexposed. (Im only a novice so maybe someone can ILLUMINATE a bit more!!) :D

Its usually best to have the camera on manual.... the power of the studio light can usually be turned down, the aperture of the camera can be made smaller to take in less light, shutterspeed made faster etc etc...there are a lot of variables ...just keep practising with all of these and you will find a setup that works for you.
 
hi janice, thanks for that bit of info will try different settings and see how i get on (i dont think i will be waiting for xmas morning to try!).
 
Hi, this is probably like the blind leading the blind here as Ive only had my lights out of the bag twice since I got them but, as far as Im aware you cant use your camera in auto mode with studio lights.
Put the camera in manual, try an aperture of around f/8
 
I'm certainly no expert on flash but if you are using two heads switch off the on-camera flash and get a cheap IR thingy that sits on your hot shoe and will fire your heads. Set the camera to manual, around 1/125th and f/8 and set the flash heads at their lowest power, check the histogram for each shot and gradually increase the power of the heads until you get what you are after.
 
I had a session in a studio once and the thing to remember is that the lighting is constant unless you change it. So once you have the settings on the camera correct, you don't need to change them. Like the others said F/8 means that you will have a very forgiving depth of field, then it is just a matter of playing with the shutter speed (or using a light meter) until you get it right.
 
oops, you don't want to use Auto at all. There is no way the camera can predict the flash's output power.
Start simple. One flash head at about 45° to the subject. Reflector opposite that flash to bounce-fill the subject.
Get a sync cable. Few quid from the better local camera shops to connect the camera directly to the flash.
Failing that, stick a bit of card under the popup flash so that it bounces the light sideways onto the studio flash to trigger it.
Camera manual setting. ~125-180th (think the fastest sync on the Fuji is 180th?) F8-11 or so.
Kill all ambient lights, especially if there is daylight coming in, blind the windows.
Then play with settings.

It shouldn't take long for you to get the hang of controlling a single head.
You can do a heck of a lot with just one head and a reflector too.

Have fun, Rob.
 
hi, and thanks rob, will try that and play about with settings, trial and error?.
 
trebs said:
Get a sync cable. Few quid from the better local camera shops to connect the camera directly to the flash.
Click to expand...

Check the voltage on the flash heads first - my understanding is that digital cameras can only take up to about 6v. If in doubt, I'd be tempted to go for the infrared trigger...
 
hi catdaddy, yes already got the infrared trigger, wife got me it for xmas with lighting kit.
 
hi i have a 2 head kit. i have a infa red remote which i use on my hotshoe, i shoot at 125th sec (i beleive shutter is irrelevant here) and i use my aperture to control exposure. if i need morfe light and dont want to sacrifice my depth of field i turn up my lights. hope this helps
 
Studio flash is a very interesting line. I think the first thing to get is a flash meter reflective or direct, with the meter and its contrast fitting you can get the light spot on all over the shot.
 
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