f1.2 daylight and flash????

onform

onform

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Are there any of you guy's or gal's that have or do shoot under these conditions??

It's not for me you understand it's for a friend...:naughty:

Say for arguments sake that 'my friend' wanted to shoot at f1.2 during a bright sunny day and wanted to under expose the background they would need a shutter speed in the high thousands if not max shutter speed! which is fine but how do you then use flash to expose the subject correctly??

My... I mean my friends max flash sync is 200th/sec so what does one do?

You can't just use a reflector because you are under exposing ambient by a half stop or more?

Most portable flash systems don't have power settings low enough anyway do they??

Unless continuous lighting is the answer.... but they are power hungry and wouldn't they have to be very powerful to counteract the fact that ambient is under exposed by half a stop or more??????

:thinking::thinking::thinking::thinking::thinking::thinking::thinking::thinking::thinking:
 
Only advise I could offer would be to use a ND filter to bring the shutter down to a reasonable length of time.
 
Canon's flash guns such as the 580ex II have high speed sync which pulses the flash so you can flash at any shutter speed.
 
ND filters, AND high speed sync, or just generally as much light as you can possibly throw towards the subject you want :) Studio heads, plugged into batteries if need be, are good form.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/itsdavedotnet/4097700361/sizes/m/ this was shot at f14 1/200th of a second to get the exposure on the background right, but had to slap the subject with 2 speedlights on full power just camera left to light him to balance it. An ND filter and correspondingly more light would've been needed to get a smaller aperture.

Alternatively you can get a camera with unlimited sync speed (nikon D40 or D70) because they use an electronic shutter and sync away really fast with a pc/wireless connected manual flash :)

edit: either all that, or composite it... :P
 
High speed sync, it'll zap the overall power of the flash as it pulses it rather then 1 large dump of light. You'll have to get the light in as close as possible
 
hmmm
try a new friend!
 
Wouldn't a ND filter just create more problems?? as all light would be stopped down not just the ambient?? also to bring the shutter speed back to 200/sec you would need a very dark ND wouldn't you?? maybe focus issues too..

Also I know I didn't mention this in the OP but multiple lights off camera are needed...so that would rule out HSS wouldn't it??
 
An ND filter may be useful for cameras with 200ISO minimum and a fastest shutter speed of 1/4000 or slower. In UK conditions, with an underexposed background, you should be able to get away with a wide aperture at 1/8000 with 100ISO. The HSS flash range would be 3 or 4m, and you could use daisy-chained dedicated cables, if suitable ones are available for your system.
 
photon said:
An ND filter may be useful for cameras with 200ISO minimum and a fastest shutter speed of 1/4000 or slower. In UK conditions, with an underexposed background, you should be able to get away with a wide aperture at 1/8000 with 100ISO. The HSS flash range would be 3 or 4m, and you could use daisy-chained dedicated cables, if suitable ones are available for your system.
Click to expand...

hhhmm daisy chained pc cables you say....???? And you mean for my friends system...;);)nudge nudge :lol:
 
High Speed Sync works with Canon's wireless E-TTL system and it will control multiple remote units automatically. That sounds like the obvious answer if you have enabled flash guns.

I'm guessing that the problem with remote E-TTL in bright light might be range - both triggering range and flash range. I find that trigering range varies quite a bit in practise, from not very far to surprisingly distant depending on whether you have good line of sight and the sensor is shaded from direct sun. Every situation is different.

If this is still a problem, you could probably get around it by using a cheap 10m dedicated cord to get the master unit off the camera and close to the other remote guns. Or v expensive radio Pocket Wizards.

Flash range is greatly reduced in HHS mode and the higher the shutter speed the lower the range. You'd just have to suck it and see.

Or use an ND filter. If you go the ND route and can get the shutter speed down to normal x-sync range, you'd be able to use cheap radio triggers which work in manual-only mode. That sorts both the range problems at a stroke.

But in bright sun you'd need maybe 6 stops of ND which would pretty much black out the viewfinder I think.
 
Pretty much covered I think. Get some radio triggers that support high-speed sync, there are a few out there apart from PWs, most seem to work better as well.

You lose flash power as said, but you're shooting at f/1.2 so you don't need a great deal of power anyway.

Depends on the conditions as well, daylight can mean a huge range of lighting situations.
 
Just mulling this over, I think there is another fundamental problem. You are basically asking a hot-shoe gun to do battle with bright sunlight, regardless of anything else. We know that that just doesn't work - not enough power at the best of times at anything like normal range. HSS reduces range substantially, and it will get shattered if you try to shoot at 1/8000sec or something. I think HSS is a non-starter TBH :shrug:

Trying to be more helpful, I think the only way will probably be to shoot on an overcast day when the flash at least has half a chance in normal x-sync mode, something like 580EX guns on full power. Then you might be able to get away with a modest ND like 3-stops which should allow the camera to work fairly normally, firing with affordable RF-602 radio triggers in full manual.

Your friend is a pain in the bum :D
 
you are almost certainly going to need to use a ND filter. the sunny 16 rule means at f/1.2 ISO 50 you are still going to need a shutter speed most likely fast than the camera can support - and HSS flash is a pretty ugly solution at best. focusing a lens at f/1.2 with ND filters on is going to prove and even more interesting challenge.
 
Jayst84 said:
You lose flash power as said, but you're shooting at f/1.2 so you don't need a great deal of power anyway.
Click to expand...

yes, but you still have the limitation that you need to expose the ambient surroundings correctly at f1.2, while keeping under 1/200th of a second for normal sync speed. This is why a low iso and maybe a ND filter (depending on how light it is) might come in handy.

If you go HSS, it increases shutter speed but limits the power your flash can fire at because it needs to flash several times in short succession.

If you go more power with your flash, you will need a more powerful flash, but can stay at 1/200th, so it only needs to pop once rather than a few times.

Maybe consider shooting at f1.4 or 1.8 instead of 1.2, it'll magically 'give you' a waaaay more powerful flash for your surroundings while keeping that sweet sweet bokeh :P
 
HoppyUK said:
High Speed Sync works with Canon's wireless E-TTL system and it will control multiple remote units automatically. That sounds like the obvious answer if you have enabled flash guns.

I'm guessing that the problem with remote E-TTL in bright light might be range - both triggering range and flash range. I find that trigering range varies quite a bit in practise, from not very far to surprisingly distant depending on whether you have good line of sight and the sensor is shaded from direct sun. Every situation is different.

If this is still a problem, you could probably get around it by using a cheap 10m dedicated cord to get the master unit off the camera and close to the other remote guns. Or v expensive radio Pocket Wizards.

Flash range is greatly reduced in HHS mode and the higher the shutter speed the lower the range. You'd just have to suck it and see.

Or use an ND filter. If you go the ND route and can get the shutter speed down to normal x-sync range, you'd be able to use cheap radio triggers which work in manual-only mode. That sorts both the range problems at a stroke.

But in bright sun you'd need maybe 6 stops of ND which would pretty much black out the viewfinder I think.
Click to expand...

HoppyUK said:
Just mulling this over, I think there is another fundamental problem. You are basically asking a hot-shoe gun to do battle with bright sunlight, regardless of anything else. We know that that just doesn't work - not enough power at the best of times at anything like normal range. HSS reduces range substantially, and it will get shattered if you try to shoot at 1/8000sec or something. I think HSS is a non-starter TBH :shrug:

Trying to be more helpful, I think the only way will probably be to shoot on an overcast day when the flash at least has half a chance in normal x-sync mode, something like 580EX guns on full power. Then you might be able to get away with a modest ND like 3-stops which should allow the camera to work fairly normally, firing with affordable RF-602 radio triggers in full manual.

Your friend is a pain in the bum :D
Click to expand...

It's good to see your going through the same thought process as me and still coming out the other end with more problems than solutions just like me.... I'm not mad then??:cuckoo:
 
Jayst84 said:
Pretty much covered I think. Get some radio triggers that support high-speed sync, there are a few out there apart from PWs, most seem to work better as well.

You lose flash power as said, but you're shooting at f/1.2 so you don't need a great deal of power anyway.

Depends on the conditions as well, daylight can mean a huge range of lighting situations.
Click to expand...

Don't suppose you have a linky to those triggers do you???
 
ruvor said:
you are almost certainly going to need to use a ND filter. the sunny 16 rule means at f/1.2 ISO 50 you are still going to need a shutter speed most likely fast than the camera can support - and HSS flash is a pretty ugly solution at best. focusing a lens at f/1.2 with ND filters on is going to prove and even more interesting challenge.
Click to expand...

You see my Quandary....:'(
 
itsdavedotnet said:
yes, but you still have the limitation that you need to expose the ambient surroundings correctly at f1.2, while keeping under 1/200th of a second for normal sync speed. This is why a low iso and maybe a ND filter (depending on how light it is) might come in handy.

If you go HSS, it increases shutter speed but limits the power your flash can fire at because it needs to flash several times in short succession.

If you go more power with your flash, you will need a more powerful flash, but can stay at 1/200th, so it only needs to pop once rather than a few times.

Maybe consider shooting at f1.4 or 1.8 instead of 1.2, it'll magically 'give you' a waaaay more powerful flash for your surroundings while keeping that sweet sweet bokeh :P
Click to expand...

The problem is I paid, (OK it is for me really), a hell of a lot of money for a lens with f1.2 and one that is sharp at f1.2 too as those are the qualities I really wanted in my images.

I want to be able to shoot a full length portrait at 85mm and retain that creamy look.. and at that distance only f1.2 will do! If that wasn't the case you can be sure I would of bought the 85mm f1.8... I really needed to be able to replicate this style under any conditions.

I think I will look into the triggers with HHS capability if they don't work as hoped it looks like i'm stuck to shooting on horrible days or in the early evening not good!
 
onform said:
The problem is I paid, (OK it is for me really), a hell of a lot of money for a lens with f1.2 and one that is sharp at f1.2 too as those are the qualities I really wanted in my images.

I want to be able to shoot a full length portrait at 85mm and retain that creamy look.. and at that distance only f1.2 will do! If that wasn't the case you can be sure I would of bought the 85mm f1.8... I really needed to be able to replicate this style under any conditions.

I think I will look into the triggers with HHS capability if they don't work as hoped it looks like i'm stuck to shooting on horrible days or in the early evening not good!
Click to expand...

Hah, yep, I understand that completely. I was just suggesting it because an extra stop down in aperture, would effectively double the power of the lighting that you have.

Maybe look into some studio heads, either mains or battery powered, and (say) an ND4 filter, they'd do the job fine :)

Tbh, it'll have to be a pretty grotty day to get a good exposure on the background at f1.2 1/200th iso100 as it is, the 1/200th limitation is just being enforced by needing to use flash. You then need to balance the flash with the subject, so will need a power level of flash that can balance with the background, despite your ND filter doing the heavy lifting of a large amount of flash power.
 
if all else fails pop down to BnQ and buy all the worklights they have :D

for multiple ocf maybe nd filters and then battery powered studio lights might be a better shout
 
The only two radio E-TTL triggers I know of are Pocket Wizards and Radio Poppers, links below. PWs are about £200 each for transmitter and receiver units and there are problems with RF interference affecting range quite a lot with certain Canon guns. Lots of internet chat about it if you search. Don't know about the Poppers - not sure they're officially imported or EC legal. One upside of the PWs is their Hypersync feature can increase the normal x-sync slightly and you might get 1/300sec maybe.

http://www.pocketwizard.com/products/transmitter_receiver/36/TT1-C/

http://www.radiopopper.com/products/

But apart from all this stuff, the fact that no regular hot-shoe gun can match full on daylight is going to be testing. HHS is a waste of time frankly, unless you have a bank of about ten guns lined up together. Even then you'll struggle in HSS mode.

Elinchrom Quadra Rangers have got a bit of poke.
 
Not sure if this will be any use to you, but I watched it the other day and it was an interesting idea - depending on what you are shooting and how the background sits in the frame. It's about getting round the sync speed by framing carefully. Certainly something I'm gonna have a play with at some point, whether it's all that useful or not I don't know.
LINKY
pip
 
itsdavedotnet said:
Hah, yep, I understand that completely. I was just suggesting it because an extra stop down in aperture, would effectively double the power of the lighting that you have.

Maybe look into some studio heads, either mains or battery powered, and (say) an ND4 filter, they'd do the job fine :)

Tbh, it'll have to be a pretty grotty day to get a good exposure on the background at f1.2 1/200th iso100 as it is, the 1/200th limitation is just being enforced by needing to use flash. You then need to balance the flash with the subject, so will need a power level of flash that can balance with the background, despite your ND filter doing the heavy lifting of a large amount of flash power.
Click to expand...

Yeah I know what your saying... but there has to be another way?
 
david1701 said:
if all else fails pop down to BnQ and buy all the worklights they have :D

for multiple ocf maybe nd filters and then battery powered studio lights might be a better shout
Click to expand...

Believe me it is something I had thought about!!
 
HoppyUK said:
The only two radio E-TTL triggers I know of are Pocket Wizards and Radio Poppers, links below. PWs are about £200 each for transmitter and receiver units and there are problems with RF interference affecting range quite a lot with certain Canon guns. Lots of internet chat about it if you search. Don't know about the Poppers - not sure they're officially imported or EC legal. One upside of the PWs is their Hypersync feature can increase the normal x-sync slightly and you might get 1/300sec maybe.

http://www.pocketwizard.com/products/transmitter_receiver/36/TT1-C/

http://www.radiopopper.com/products/

But apart from all this stuff, the fact that no regular hot-shoe gun can match full on daylight is going to be testing. HHS is a waste of time frankly, unless you have a bank of about ten guns lined up together. Even then you'll struggle in HSS mode.

Elinchrom Quadra Rangers have got a bit of poke.
Click to expand...

I love the idea of the Quadra's I almost brought them instead of the 85mm!!! They can't do HSS though can they??
 
Pippy_Neville said:
Not sure if this will be any use to you, but I watched it the other day and it was an interesting idea - depending on what you are shooting and how the background sits in the frame. It's about getting round the sync speed by framing carefully. Certainly something I'm gonna have a play with at some point, whether it's all that useful or not I don't know.
LINKY
pip
Click to expand...

Cheers Pip. I had seen and used that technique before.. But alas it is not really the answer I'm after, but thanks for your input :thumbs:
 
onform said:
I love the idea of the Quadra's I almost brought them instead of the 85mm!!! They can't do HSS though can they??
Click to expand...

No. Quantums maybe?
 
IMPORTANT NOTE: The following might be entirely incorrect, hopefully it will encourage someone to think about the numbers involved and, hopefully, post an errata if necessary.

Assumption 1: Shooting at midday in sunny conditions.
Assumption 2: Using a camera with ISO100 film, or Sensor capable of ISO100 rating.
Assumption 3: Using a camera with a max shutter of 1/4000
Assumption 4: Using a camera with a max sync of 1/250
Assumption 5: Using a portable thyristor-cut flash, not a capacitor-dump studio strobe.
Assumption 6: Flash to subject distance of 8ft, bare flash zoomed to 105mm.

Sunny 16 rule suggests f16 @ 1/125 at ISO 100 (Technically 1/100 but lets round it to make it easier)

This means 7 stops between f16 and f1.4, requiring a shutter of 1/16,000 to maintain correct exposure.

To get the shot to 1/4000th second to allow your camera to expose it normally at f1.4, you will need a 2stop ND over the lens to begin with.

Now we start to think about flash. Take an SB-800, which has a GN of 184ft @ 105mm @ ISO 100. Assuming a target distance of 8ft gives us correct exposure at ~f22. We've already knocked 2 stops off with our ND filter, which gives us f11 on the flash. This seems like we have plenty of power to spare (6 stops) but there's a minor problem.

Even if your camera could sync at 1/4000 (Which assumption 4 rules out) the flash pulse at full power is 1/1050s meaning you're capturing, best case, only 1/4 of the power. (It's actually not a square distribution so the figure would be more favourable, but let's keep this as simple as possible!) That would be another 2 stops off, giving you f5.6 on the flash. Still plenty to spare, so it seems workable on the D70 with its unlimited sync speed. (A studio strobe's discharge is much slower, so you would need a much more powerful strobe to ensure that enough of its light output was captured in the 1/4000 exposure window).

(As an aside, if you were not shooting the flash at 105mm zoom and shot it at 35, its GN is only 125, meaning that its output at 8ft is f16, giving us a final power of f4, still fine, but worth bearing in mind)

However, we need to get the shutterspeed down to 1/250 so that we can sync the flashes, and we're still at 1/4000. This means we need to knock another 4 stops off (4000->2000->1000->500->250th) daylight. Let's stick an 4-stop ND on top of our already attached 2-stop ND (ND4?), now we can shoot 1/250, ISO 100, f1.4 and get a proper daylight exposure. However what just happened to the flash? We just ate 4 more stops, bringing our 105mm zoomed SB800 exposure from f 11 down 4 stops to f2.8 . Excellent! Still power to spare! We could even throw another 2 stop ND on the filter to underexpose daylight by 2 stops and still get an exposure (8 stops ND in total).

Bear in mind that at 105mm zoom @ 8ft, your light will cover a target roughly 5.5ft high, and that only the centremost portion will be at full illumination due to falloff.

Were you to use High Speed Sync instead of ND filters, you lose 1 stop of power for each stop of shutterspeed you go above sync. Therefore pushing from 1/250 would cost you 4 stops of power, the same as reducing the exposure with ND filters. Given that the flash exposure would be f11 (Accounting for the 2 stop ND on the lens to get you into a normal daylight exposure), HSS would give you f2.8 on the flash, still enough juice to light the target.
 
Denyerec :)

But this is the reality of Canon HSS. 580EX gun, full power, head at 105mm, 8ft distance, outdoors, ISO100, at 1/8000sec - f/2.8 gives correct exposure. Canon 40D, 17-55 2.8 lens.

That should equate pretty accurately to 1/2000sec at f/1.4, which is about 3 stops short of Sunny 16. You would need eight guns firing together to get it up to the daylight levels.

In reality, I think HSS is a non starter. The only workable combination is a powerful flash gun (eg 580EX) but on a dull or at least overcast day, plus an ND filter of say three stops.

Tiggered by E-TTL infrared, in manual or auto as you prefer, but this will at least maintain the normal x-sync speed. Most radio triggers introduce a delay, dropping 1/200sec down to about 1/125sec which you cannot afford. But Pocket Wizards do not have any significant delay, and the new ones also have the Hypersync feature which could be handy.
 
Wow! now that is what I call technical !!!!

OK

1. Canon 5D capable of shooting at ISO 50

Does that make any difference?

2. Max shutter speed 1/8000

3. xsync of 1/200

4. midday sunny conditions...
 
ISO50 will knock 1 more stop off the daylight, requiring only 1 stop ND as opposed to two to get the ambient exposure correct, however it won't change the flash situation.

Max sync of 1/200 is 1/3 of a stop. Means you will need to cull ambient by an extra 1/3 of a stop.

As for 4), this is England, so I really think that's going to be the biggest problem ;)

Bear in mind the sunny 16 rule is a very rough approximation. It was dark when I got home, so you might find that your daylight measurement is actually lower than the estimated 1/4000 @ f2.8
 
I have looked at it like this: I think there is a big difference between forcing everything to the max for a particular shot in specific circumstances, and having a reliable technique for shooting flash generally at very low f/numbers, in whatever light God has given you on the day, with different subjects at various distances.

The way I would attempt that, at least as a first experiment, would be with a 580EXII on E-TTL, plus 1-stop, 2-stops and 3-stops NDs. Use the 2+3 together in really bright light but I think that might effectively rule out using the viewfinder in practise, even though AF and metering should still work fine (cover the viewfinder eyepiece). Maybe worth considering a separate optical viewfinder just for framing?

A set of Hoya NDs like this is pretty cheap, and that's all you need to spend, at least initially, and it might just do the trick. I thought HSS was the way to go at first, but it just hasn't got the power at the shutter speeds you'll need to use.
 
am I missing something here ?

put the subject in the shade (or make shade where your subject is) and then meter for the highlights (non shade) and let a handful of flashes bring the ambient in the shade upto what you want? will need no where near as much flash power and if set up right you'll never know they were in the shade.
 
I had EV15 conditions at lunchtime today. Underexposing the ambient by a stop gave me 1/5000 at ƒ/1.8 with 100ISO, and my SB-600 with its modest guide number of 30m could illuminate a subject at 2m. At greater distances, the flash gives an underexposure warning.

The HSS specs aren't published for the SB-600, as far as I know, but for the Pentax 540 unit the GN is 6.2m at the 85mm zoom position for 1/6000 at ISO100, which equates to about 5m at ƒ/1.2. The Pentax is a bit less powerful than the Canon 580. I'll test it again some time with my ƒ/1.4 85mm, but my oldish Pentax cameras are limited to 1/4000 and ISO200.

The ƒ/1.8 I used today is a stop slower than ƒ/1.2 so the faster aperture would need a 1 stop ND filter to bring the shutter speed down to about 1/5000 for a stop underexposure in bright conditions.
 
cheers guys. I'm going to give it a go this weekend. I have an nd4 which I am going to bluetack to a filter ring with iso 50 and see what we get... It's not going to be sunny no doubt but it will be intersting to see just how the flash reacts...

It all makes interesting reading mind...not a subject i have seen raised before.
 
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