wedding dress!

spencer

spencer

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I'm helping out at a wedding tomorrow, & went to the rehersals last night in the church.
I had a bit of a play in the church with my settings ready for Saturday.

Now my problem is that when the bride & groom have finished signing the book, they will walk back down the isle & pause while I take some photo's, I will be using my 430ex (with a stoffen) so do I meter off the dress & set the flash to -1 or will the flash meter the white wedding dress OK?:shrug:

Any help much appreciated.

Spence
 
From experience with the 430 ex it needs a + 1 or even a + 2 for this situation.
It all depends on how high the church roof is, I would suggest firing the flash head on at + 1 if it's high. Shoot RAW and that way it will give you some leeway with the exposure, or up the ISO and shoot without flash.


571.jpg


550 EX Flash head on with stoffen

AH10009.jpg


No Flash
 
I think Canon's ETTL2 flash system is a bit of a mystery to many, certainly me, so I've been trying to learn a bit more about how to safeguard my shots. Here are some tips...

In Av or Tv mode the flash will assume it is providing fill and will set an aperture or shutter speed to capture the ambient light correctly or underexpose it slightly. It will then top up as it sees fit (by default probably not enough). This can lead to some surprisingly slow shutter speeds. Take control and shoot with manual exposure for the background.

Coupling the camera with a lens that passes distance (focus) information and the flash head in the straight ahead position ETTL-2 will use that distance information to feed into the exposure calculations. If you put a modifier on your flash (Omnibounce, for example) the camera will have no idea that you have fitted it and the light emitted will be calculated based on a direct line of sight to the subject. Your shot will likely be underexposed.

ETTL-2 likes to protect highlights at all costs. Anything reflective or very pale that gets caught in the frame - glass/metal/white paint/wedding dress - will cause the flash to quench early. Be ready to add a fair handful of +ve FEC in these situations. If you know a white wedding dress is your primary subject then you will have to turn up the FEC to get a white dress instead of grey.

Here is a series of test shots to show the effects of ever increasing FEC from +0 to +2 stops in 1/3 stop increments. I mocked up a white dress by using a white sheet and shot in my somewhat dim hallway, with a hint of backlight from the windows behind. I metered the ambient and set exposure manually to be about right and then let the flash take care of the subject. The histogram shown is for the last shot, taken at +2 FEC. I think that is the only shot that would even begin to do justice to a wedding dress. Whatever you do, double check your histogram on the critical shots.

Good luck :)

MWSnap%202008-06-06%2C%2009_27_38.jpg
 
PapaLazarou said:
From experience with the 430 ex it needs a + 1 or even a + 2 for this situation.
It all depends on how high the church roof is, I would suggest firing the flash head on at + 1 if it's high. Shoot RAW and that way it will give you some leeway with the exposure, or up the ISO and shoot without flash.


571.jpg


550 EX Flash head on with stoffen

AH10009.jpg


No Flash
Click to expand...
Thanks PL, Ive already tried without the flash, but its really dark inside the church, I did try with the flash & got a good result with +1 as well but I am a bit worried about blowing the dress.
I'll go with the flash at +1 & let you know how it goes.

Spence














cherryrig said:
I would try and not use any flash at all. Only use it if you really really need it, but meter off the dress and match the flash to that, to fill in.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the reply Cherryrig, I will need the flash for sure, (the church is very similar to the one in PL's first photo.)but going to opt for PL answer.
many thanks
Spence

tdodd said:
I think Canon's ETTL2 flash system is a bit of a mystery to many, certainly me, so I've been trying to learn a bit more about how to safeguard my shots. Here are some tips...

In Av or Tv mode the flash will assume it is providing fill and will set an aperture or shutter speed to capture the ambient light correctly or underexpose it slightly. It will then top up as it sees fit (by default probably not enough). This can lead to some surprisingly slow shutter speeds. Take control and shoot with manual exposure for the background.

Coupling the camera with a lens that passes distance (focus) information and the flash head in the straight ahead position ETTL-2 will use that distance information to feed into the exposure calculations. If you put a modifier on your flash (Omnibounce, for example) the camera will have no idea that you have fitted it and the light emitted will be calculated based on a direct line of sight to the subject. Your shot will likely be underexposed.

ETTL-2 likes to protect highlights at all costs. Anything reflective or very pale that gets caught in the frame - glass/metal/white paint/wedding dress - will cause the flash to quench early. Be ready to add a fair handful of +ve FEC in these situations. If you know a white wedding dress is your primary subject then you will have to turn up the FEC to get a white dress instead of grey.

Here is a series of test shots to show the effects of ever increasing FEC from +0 to +2 stops in 1/3 stop increments. I mocked up a white dress by using a white sheet and shot in my somewhat dim hallway, with a hint of backlight from the windows behind. I metered the ambient and set exposure manually to be about right and then let the flash take care of the subject. The histogram shown is for the last shot, taken at +2 FEC. I think that is the only shot that would even begin to do justice to a wedding dress. Whatever you do, double check your histogram on the critical shots.

Good luck :)

MWSnap%202008-06-06%2C%2009_27_38.jpg
Click to expand...

Thanks for the heads up tdodd, I'll let you know how it goes.

Spence
 
Grab some funky foam and make yourself a bounce-card & run some tests. There's some instructions if you really need them at : http://www.cs.hmc.edu/~geoff/diy/softbox.html

I laminated the black and white foam together with a peice of household tinfoil between them, then trimmed them carefully and mount them with velro. They look solid enough that I've been asked on occasions where I bought them from. Total cost about £2.

The reason I mention this is that the large area of the bounce card (Around A4 size) gives a much softer finish than the Stoffen. OK, it's a little more cumbersome which may be a concern for you, but the light quality is much improved.
 
Denyerec said:
Grab some funky foam and make yourself a bounce-card & run some tests. There's some instructions if you really need them at : http://www.cs.hmc.edu/~geoff/diy/softbox.html

I laminated the black and white foam together with a peice of household tinfoil between them, then trimmed them carefully and mount them with velro. They look solid enough that I've been asked on occasions where I bought them from. Total cost about £2.

The reason I mention this is that the large area of the bounce card (Around A4 size) gives a much softer finish than the Stoffen. OK, it's a little more cumbersome which may be a concern for you, but the light quality is much improved.
Click to expand...

tdodd said:
I got five A5 sheets for £1.75 including delivery from http://www.dizzycardsandcrafts.co.uk/index.asp. They seem out of stock at the mo.

Plenty more suppliers here though....

http://www.google.co.uk/products?as...rice1=&price2=&as_occt=title&show=dd&safe=off
Click to expand...



Thanks all, but I am going to stick with my stoffen!;)

Spence
 
Jacco said:
It's your loss, Spence.

Good luck, today!
Click to expand...

Go easy on the man eh. ;)

The night before the battle is no time to go changing the plan of attack, unless you're a hardened soldier. :lol:
 
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