Pap style shoot

[paulminus273]

A friend is getting married at the end of next month and has ask me to bring my camera to shoot some Pap style images at the party. There is a pro doing the wedding thank goodness.

Kit wise I have a s2pro(too slow) and a d90 lenses 50mm 1.8, 18-105 vr, 55-200vr and sigma 28-135 f3.8-5.6 plus 2 sb900.

Now I am thinking of d90, 18-105, and a sb900 on camera, set to Aperture priority, auto fp in case the ambient light pushes the shutter speed up, bounce off the ceiling if it is low enough if not straight ahead may be a sofen .
Would those of you who have experience be kind enough to point out any errors in my thinking or other tip that would be useful.
Thanks

 

[specialman]

letting the camera default to FP means you will see some loss in power, so you should bear that in mind if you aim to light from distance without resorting to really wide apertures.

The camera/lens/flash combo is fine - I'd try to bounce the flash wherever and whenever possible; even if the ceiling seems too high, try the flash at full power (manual mode) because it will look so much better than direct flash. IF the ceiling doesn't allow any bounce then look at side walls.... sideways bounce looks nice and can create that big softbox look without too much hassle.

If you are bouncing, watch for colour casts; creams and light ceiling are fine but once you get into big colours like green and red, you can get some awful colours bouncing back and it can prove a nightmare when mixed with ambient. In those cases I either aim to kill the ambient (so I can colour correct one light source in PP) or convert to B&W

 

[mark1616]

If at all possible get the bounce off of a wall as well, not just the ceiling otherwise you get some pretty boring light with no shape. Sure it is better than direct but off a wall as well is better still. I usually have the flash backwards to the side and up all at 45 degrees. He is an example of my wife shooting using this style.

 

[paulminus273]

Thank you both for that it is so long since I use on camera flash a tilt head was state of the art, so I had not even considered using the walls.
If I have RTFM right auto fp only kicks in at shutter speeds faster than 1/250, with f5.6 widest at the long end the chances of that are low?
I had better have a play before hand