Beginner Issues with flash photos

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Ken3966

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Ken
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I am a little confused. I have taken loads of pictures with my GX7 panasonic, but not many with the built in flash as I usually have a 14-140 lens on it and this shadows the flash, hence I would normally use a clip on external metz flash.I haven't even used this much as normally photographing outside but have had no obvious issues with the resulting photos.

Yesterday an unexpected need to take a lot of indoor photos cropped up and I had only the camera and fortunately a 20mm prime lens in the camera bag which works with the built in flash.

I took a number of pictures of people in a small lounge. About a third came out correctly with normal looking colours, The rest came out orange tinted and very poor. The flash fired for every picture so I am not sure what I was doing wrong?

I was wondering if this was the latest style energy saving bulbs which must be flashing on and off at 50 Hz and depending on whether or not they are on or off when the shutter and camera flash fires gives a good picture or not.

Any thoughts for next time I have to do this and how to get a better success rate?
 
I would hazard a guess that the camera is setting the white balance for the flash and the energy saving lights are cycling through a colour shift and therefore some of them are coming out with a different WB - you can reduce shutter speed to counteract this.
 
As above, I'd like to see the images and exif.
 
Are you sure the flash fired for the unsatisfactory shots? If they have come out orange tinted it could be picking up the tungsten lighting usually found indoors. The exif data should tell you whether the flash fired.
So. Pretty much what Phil and Ned said. :)
 
Thanks, I think I have reasoned this out. It is a very fast lens and it seems it was deciding in automatic mode that the flash wasn't needed, even though I was sure it had flashed each time. When I have used the built in flash before it was with the much slower original kit lens which came with the camera.

Reasonable picture properties
File Name _1480574.JPG
Camera Model Name DMC-GX7
Shooting Date/Time 25/07/2015 22:48:02
Tv (Shutter Speed) 1/60
Av (Aperture Value) 1.7
Exposure Compensation 0
ISO Speed 250
Image Size 4592x3448
Flash On
Color Space Adobe RGB
File Size 7840 KB

Poor picture properties
File Name _1480573.JPG
Camera Model Name DMC-GX7
Shooting Date/Time 25/07/2015 22:47:54
Tv (Shutter Speed) 1/8
Av (Aperture Value) 1.7
Exposure Compensation 0
ISO Speed 200
Image Size 4592x3448
Flash On
Color Space Adobe RGB
File Size 6866 KB

I would rather not post pictures of my relatives children on here so I will pass with uploading the photos.

The camera was set to TTL, so how does it decide whether to use the flash or not? If the flash is opened I would have expected it to use it and go for the higher speed possible? How can I force the flash to be used on this camera sp I don't have this problem next time.

As an aside does anyone know why my camera, a panasonic GX7 sometimes gives pictures the file name of _1480573.JPG and at other times P1480573.JPG?
 
The one thing I can see from the exif data is that the shutter speed is only ⅛ on the second shot (_1480573.jpg) but 1/60 on the first (_1480574.jpg) . At a ⅛ of a second the sensor will pick up a lot more ambient (orange) light and is quiet slow. Change to manual and control the camera rather than letting it control you.

('Energy saving' bulbs by the way are more likely to give a green cast, as will fluorescent tubes).
 
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If that's correct EXIF data it's saying flash was on for the poor shot. I'd agree with the comment from @shreds above.

OP how did you end up with a 1/8 sec shutter speed? We're you using a semi auto setting?
 
I use a simple 'rule of thumb' with on camera flash. When flash is the primary light source I use Manual exposure settings, this allows control of the ambient light - whether I want it to be completely overpowered or whether it's creating an 'atmosphere'.

In your case, I'm guessing you were in Aperture priority and the camera just lowered the shutter speed to get you a correct exposure without the flash, the flash probably has fired, but the camera may have decided it was only needed for 'fill', so most of the exposure is lit by tungsten.
 
The camera was on the intelligent auto mode, as it was being used by a number of different people, depending who was to be in the pictures.
I can't find any setting to force the flash to fire, I thought that opening the flash would do that, as closing it clearly disables it?

This has only happened with this lens, the slower kit lens always seems to use the flash correctly in the past.

I will look at the speed next time. I think the other mistake I made was not to use the aperture priority setting, as the depth of field in focus was not enough in most of the pictures.

Anyway all lessons to bear in mind next time.
 
Perhaps thinking of 'intelligent auto' as unintelligent auto, as the camera is not as clever as you are. I would not use Aperture priority either as it will create similar issues with slow shutter speeds, probably worse than what you are getting at present...it will hold the aperture to maintain the depth of field (DoF) but drop the speeds so slow that the resultant images will be blurred unless you can force the flash to fire as well. In manual at least you know what is going to happen once you understand the basics of shutter speed, aperture and ISO. The flash is such a short a duration you can then use that to freeze any movement.

Of course if the camera is being passed around, you are reliant on the users having a certain level of camera knowledge too....
 
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