GESO - Balancing flash with available light

[Christine Aguila]

George:  Thanks for posting this.  Very interesting drill.  I might give it 
a go with my flash.  Cheers, Christine


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "George Sinos" <gsinos at gmail.com>
To: "Pentax-Discuss Mail List" <pdml at pdml.net>
Sent: Sunday, June 01, 2008 11:14 AM
Subject: GESO - Balancing flash with available light


> Balancing flash with available light.
>
> This is a gallery of a few shots put together for a class drill.  The
> idea is to light the foreground subject with the flash and the
> background with available light.  The lightness/darkness of the
> background is controlled by changing the shutter speed. The aperture
> is held constant for all photos. The P-TTL flash keeps the subject lit
> at the desired level.
>
> For the Pentax folks here's a little additional info.
>
> The Flash is a 540 set in the wireless mode.  It's set to +1/2 stop
> flash exposure compensation.  It's zoomed in as far as possible to
> narrow help keep light from spilling onto the background.  There are
> only seven images in the gallery, but I did a lot of experimenting and
> fired the shutter just short of 100 times.  The flash is very close to
> the subject so it probably didn't need to use much energy.  Even when
> I was experimenting with very small apertures requiring noticeably
> more powerful flashes the flash recycled almost immediately.  The AA
> alkaline batteries seemed to work OK for this application.
>
> The lens is the DA* 50-135mm f/2.8.  The focus point is the black
> queen in the back row.
>
> The camera is the K20d, flash set to wireless control mode.  Manual
> mode for this series.  Though I had set the white balance to daylight,
> it didn't make any difference.  I had custom setting at "WB auto when
> flash attached."  I've since set it to "unchanged" so it will use the
> WB as set on the camera.  No matter, I was shooting raw files.
>
> Here's the link
>
> <http://Georges.smugmug.com/gallery/5066768_nv8WE/1/304882093_iUGLx>
>
> Oh, the opening image documenting the setup was shot with a Canon G9.
>
> This was time well spent, if only to learn about the custom settings
> on the camera and flash that interact.  I've only had the K20 and 540
> for a short time.
>
> GS
> <http://www.georgesphotos.net>
>
> -- 
> PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List
> PDML at pdml.net
> http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
> to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and 
> follow the directions.
>