I have a canon 60d and ex430 flash, any advise on how I can use them for my first portraits?should I buy umbrella should I use off camera alone or with on board flash, any tips I have just bought these so any further expense needs to be on fairly tight budget, looking to shoot inside against White wall in local club.head and shoulder close ups.
First portrait using flash
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Mahoneyd187
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Off camera and with an umbrella will produce just fine results if you position it well 
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onform
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Off camera and with an umbrella will produce just fine results if you position it well
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I agree But On camera with a diffuser will work just fine if used properly too.
It depends on how much time you have to set up shot. If you have seconds then on board will do if you have more then off camera will be better, but try to diffuse the light as much as possible then as a starting point place the light 45deg slightly higher to the subject.
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A shoot-through umbrella, on a stand with an adapter bracket, works well. £30? Make a reflector out of a sheet of card and kitchen foil. If you want the pure white background look, you will need another light, probably two. You know that your 60D acts as a master auto-flash controller for the 430 as a remote slave? Great feature 
But without spending a bean, get yourself a tame subject and have a play around. You need a room with a normal height white ceiling, and light coloured walls. Draw the curtains if it's daylight. And you need a bounce card because Canon has unhelpfully forgotten to fit one to the 430 - just a business card and a rubber band will do, see here www.abetterbouncecard.com Put the 430 on camera, without the bounce card, in E-TTL mode. Camera on manual, 1/200sec at f/5.6, high ISO800 for this test, just to make sure you don't run out of flash power and get under exposure (bounce flash uses a lot of power).
- Stand in front of the subject and, just for comparison purposes, point the flash straight at the subject. Note the harsh shadows.
- Now point the flash straight up at the ceiling. Note the soft shadows, because the ceiling has now become a much bigger, and therefore much softer light source.
- Now fit the bounce card, and do the same thing - straight up. Note the shadows under eyes and chin have been lifted, and there's a nice sparkle in the eyes.
- Same again, but angle the flash head foward two or three clicks. Note how the light coming from the little bounce card has got brighter.
- Take off the bounce card, and turn the flash compeletely around so it is firing straight at the wall behind you. See how you like that.
- Then turn the flash head so that it is behind and to one side.
- Then up a bit so that it is pointing half at the wall and half at the ceiling.
- Then point it at the side wall. Note how the direction of the shadows changes, and maybe put the reflector on the shadow side to lighten them.
Now you're away There are loads of accessories available to help with this stuff, but they mostly all work in pretty much the same way as a simple bounce card - using the ceiling/wall as the main light source, with a dash of fill-in from the card. Works great, and once you get the hang of it, you can turn most social environments into something that looks pretty good.
But without spending a bean, get yourself a tame subject and have a play around. You need a room with a normal height white ceiling, and light coloured walls. Draw the curtains if it's daylight. And you need a bounce card because Canon has unhelpfully forgotten to fit one to the 430 - just a business card and a rubber band will do, see here www.abetterbouncecard.com Put the 430 on camera, without the bounce card, in E-TTL mode. Camera on manual, 1/200sec at f/5.6, high ISO800 for this test, just to make sure you don't run out of flash power and get under exposure (bounce flash uses a lot of power).
- Stand in front of the subject and, just for comparison purposes, point the flash straight at the subject. Note the harsh shadows.
- Now point the flash straight up at the ceiling. Note the soft shadows, because the ceiling has now become a much bigger, and therefore much softer light source.
- Now fit the bounce card, and do the same thing - straight up. Note the shadows under eyes and chin have been lifted, and there's a nice sparkle in the eyes.
- Same again, but angle the flash head foward two or three clicks. Note how the light coming from the little bounce card has got brighter.
- Take off the bounce card, and turn the flash compeletely around so it is firing straight at the wall behind you. See how you like that.
- Then turn the flash head so that it is behind and to one side.
- Then up a bit so that it is pointing half at the wall and half at the ceiling.
- Then point it at the side wall. Note how the direction of the shadows changes, and maybe put the reflector on the shadow side to lighten them.
Now you're away
There are loads of accessories available to help with this stuff, but they mostly all work in pretty much the same way as a simple bounce card - using the ceiling/wall as the main light source, with a dash of fill-in from the card. Works great, and once you get the hang of it, you can turn most social environments into something that looks pretty good.
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