May be a stupid question for some, but what mode is best for shooting with the canon flash system indoors during a reception with limited available lighting?

Bill

manual.

manual mode

arrive early and adjust your flash output to get the desired effect.

I split time between manual and Av when shooting ambient, but always manual when shooting flash.

Ah, Manual. I would have picked Tv mode on 1/100th .. would that work?

fotonix wrote:
Ah, Manual. I would have picked Tv mode on 1/100th .. would that work?


well if you are shooting ettl it will work because the flash will compensate accordingly but remember that you wont be able to control ambient without changing your shutterspeeds.

saying this i always shoot M at receptions

Manual

Tv not too reliable

"P" for professional.

Munual

Manual

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

fotonix wrote:
Ah, Manual. I would have picked Tv mode on 1/100th .. would that work?


Not well. In Av or Tv modes ETTL will try to act as fill, rather then main lighting, in M mode ETTL will act as main, and you can adjust shutter to pull in the ambient light. The only time I will use flash outside of M is in Av mode for fill in bright light. Receptions are usually ISO 800-1600, f2.8 and 1/40th or so, to 1/100 if I am shooting with a longer lens.

Night mode

i normally have 1 camera set to M, 1/125 at 2.8-4. This is my "safe" setup.

The other camera normally has the 50/1.2 on it and is set to av or tv, this is my more risky setup as it's usually shooting in the f1.x area.

The risky setup looks better pic wise, but I decide on the shot which rig to use.

I used to shoot them in A priority..it gave me fits.
Now I switched to M priority...f 2.8 and adjust my shutter speed to however much light I want on the background and just shoot. SO much easier and the exposures are much more right.

Av if you want the ambient light to be your "main light". But... if the ambient is too dark and you need your flash to be the amin source of light, then you need manual mode. Tv works the same as Av in this regard for lighting.

I've seen two statements made that directly contradict what I was taught about Canon eTTL systems. As I've always be given to believe in AV (aperature priority/aperature value) the system assumes ambient as main and uses the flash to add fill. In TV (shutter priority/time value) assumes the flash to be the main light. If you think about it there's a logic to it. If ambient is too bright you tend to close down the aperature. If too dark, to open the aperature to let in more light. So it's not too much of a stretch to assume the user is basing exposure on ambient in AV mode. Shutter speed is often adjusted with the freezing of motion in mind. Nothing freezes motion in an image better than flash.

Take a shot using eTTL flash in AV mode... note shutter speed. Switch to TV mode match shutter and aperature speed and take a second shot. Compare the results and the output of the flash in the two shots. Everytime I've tried it I get a much higher power dump in TV mode than in AV mode. If Canon's eTTL system treated both the same the power dumps would be equal.

As memory serves you can find an article on how Canon eTTL responds to AV vs TV modes by camera flash guru Neil Van Niekerk's www.planetneil.com.

What mode do I use for receptions? It depends on what I'm shooting and the result I'm after. At any given wedding I'm likely to use a combination of AV, TV and Manual modes.... non-flash, bounced on-camera flash, off-camera flash, and mixed on-camear/off-camera flash.

PHotosbyrdd, if your brain works that fast my hat if off to you.
Indoors I just set it and leave it...pretty much.

M

blueirisarts wrote:
Av if you want the ambient light to be your "main light". But... if the ambient is too dark and you need your flash to be the amin source of light, then you need manual mode. Tv works the same as Av in this regard for lighting.

+1

Claude

I didn't find anything on Neil's site, but the results with google says Av and Tv both expose for the ambient/background and the flash is for fill. But, I only spent a minute or two on it. I pretty much never use Tv, so not sure how it works in real life.
.


PhotosByRDD wrote:
I've seen two statements made that directly contradict what I was taught about Canon eTTL systems. As I've always be given to believe in AV (aperature priority/aperature value) the system assumes ambient as main and uses the flash to add fill. In TV (shutter priority/time value) assumes the flash to be the main light. If you think about it there's a logic to it. If ambient is too bright you tend to close down the aperature. If too dark, to open the aperature to let in more light. So it's not too much of a stretch to assume the user is basing exposure on ambient in AV mode. Shutter speed is often adjusted with the freezing of motion in mind. Nothing freezes motion in an image better than flash.

Take a shot using eTTL flash in AV mode... note shutter speed. Switch to TV mode match shutter and aperature speed and take a second shot. Compare the results and the output of the flash in the two shots. Everytime I've tried it I get a much higher power dump in TV mode than in AV mode. If Canon's eTTL system treated both the same the power dumps would be equal.

As memory serves you can find an article on how Canon eTTL responds to AV vs TV modes by camera flash guru Neil Van Niekerk's www.planetneil.com.

What mode do I use for receptions? It depends on what I'm shooting and the result I'm after. At any given wedding I'm likely to use a combination of AV, TV and Manual modes.... non-flash, bounced on-camera flash, off-camera flash, and mixed on-camear/off-camera flash.

Found a little chunk of text on canon's website:

"As we mentioned before, both the Av and Tv (shutter-priority) modes will always attempt to properly expose the ambient light in the background when you use flash - whether you're in bright or dim lighting."

From here:

http://www.usa.canon.com/content/Speedlite/index.html

I remember reading somewhere, but damn if I can find it. I did find various cites that both assume fill. I've been wrong before.

Wes Allen wrote:
Found a little chunk of text on canon's website:

"As we mentioned before, both the Av and Tv (shutter-priority) modes will always attempt to properly expose the ambient light in the background when you use flash - whether you're in bright or dim lighting."

From here:

http://www.usa.canon.com/content/Speedlite/index.html

That's pretty much in line with my own experience. I use AV outdoors all the time with on camera light for fill. I usually dial in -2 or -3 stops of FEC...if you don't, the camera will try to expose the subject to match the ambient and they get blasted with light. It will look pretty obvious you're using a flash, but at two or three stops under it looks pretty natural. As others have said though, if I'm using flash as the primary light I always shoot manual. Unless it's really well lit where you're shooting, any mode other than manual will drag your shutter to the point you'll probably get unwanted blur.

I've been getting pleasing results indoors using AV mode with flash

I used to use Manual, but didn't like it as I like to bring in a lot of ambient and couldn't change settings fast enough - but that was events settings where everything happened quite fast. I use AV now

I usually set AV to -1 or -2 EC though

Sometimes I switch to manual if the light is too variable (counter intuitive, but it's to prevent issues where the ambient overpowers the flash causing blur streaks)