High speed sync - canon

As Tim mentions, it's the LumiQuest Quik Bounce that I use. About £40 http://www.lumiquest.com/store/products/LumiQuest-Quik-Bounce.html

You need to remember that most of the effect that you get with any of these devises is determined by the bounce surface as that's where the majority of the light goes. They tend not to mention that in the ads, but in the same situation you'll get much the same result from a bounce-card as a Stofen as a Fong or any other bounce-fill type thing.

The Lumiquest is just a very convenient way of doing that, with a few advantages of efficiency, slightly softer fill-in (because it's bigger than most), it flips vertical/horizontal quickly and folds away flat.

It's also good for direct flash, with the flaps closed, as it's much softer than a bare flash and it lifts the light position a bit higher - about the same height as Neilvn's rig.

There's no perfect solution though, and I sometimes use bare flash (for a dash fill-in or when you just need max power), or the Lumiquest, or I've just built a more extensive rig that I'm rather pleased with. It's basically a giant version of the Lumiquest, using two guns and a mini-softbox on a bracket. Works great - my studio on legs :D
 
Something else I have wondered and probably looking in the wrong places, but if you were in manual mode, or it may not matter if it was AV or even TV. How does the +/-FEC work? Is it something done in camera or does it communicate to the flash and tell it to reduce or increase actual power :shrug:
 
When you shoot with flash you have two exposures to balance - the ambient and the flash - and you can control them independently. FEC for flash works in exactly the same way as EC for ambient. When you shoot with ETTL-II the camera does all the work, sending out a brief pre-flash to measure the light reflected back from the flash, calculates the power required for a "correct" exposure and then lets rip with the power it thinks is required. If you have the camera in Av/Tv/P mode and the flash in ETTL-II mode then the camera will try to balance the blend of light for you. ETTL-II flash metering is fooled by a predominance of dark or light tones in the scene, just like metering for ambient. Just as you can adjust EC for artistic taste or to compensate for an unusual tonal balance for ambient light you can do the same thing with FEC for the flash

Equally, when setting your ambient exposure manually the concept of EC disappears (for Canon) and if you set the flash power manually the option for FEC disappears. In both cases you are in control and you dial in just the exposure/power you want and the camera won't fiddle with it.

You do need to be a little careful with Canon's system if you don't know how it works. When I shot my first wedding I left the camera in Av mode and let the camera and flash do its thing. Pretty much every shot was underexposed and at times my slow zoom lens meant I was getting slow shutter speeds and evidence of blur in the subjects. Nowadays I set my ambient exposure manually and leave the flash to roam free using ETTL-II. However, it is important to evaluate the scene before you, chimp your shots and check your histogram to make sure you are getting the right results. Once you are dialed in then you should be pretty OK, and with the ambient exposure locked down you'll only have to worry about what the flash is doing. If you get the bride on her own then expect to ramp up the FEC. If you get the groom on his own then you might need to back it off. A good default is probably to nudge the FEC up a notch or two and then adjust from there.
 
Just to add one more thing, when you are mixing flash and ambient you need to think about colour temperature unless you are happy to shoot black and white. This was another little lesson learned from my first wedding. If you have a tungsten lit orangey ambient light and throw in some nice blue/white light from the flash you need to be aware of the issues that can cause. If you are using ceiling bounce and very little direct flash then the temperatures will mix and create a fairly even blend. If you are overpowering ambient completely by keeping shutter speed up then the ambient won't matter. But if you are using strong direct flash and pulling in a significant amount of ambient then you'll find you have an orange room and blue people and you can't white balance that out easily.

If you want freedom not to worry then you can gel your flash with an orange gel (CTO) to bring the colour temperatures closer together and it's one less thing to worry about. You'll lose some flash power - about a stop - but it could be a life saver. That said, some people like a slight imbalance so that the cooler flash light cuts through the orangey fog and makes the people pop. However, you still need to close the gap somewhat, perhaps with a half CTO gel.

The woes of my first wedding laid bare, and some good advice received - http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=286091
 
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