[and]

On a recent vacation I ran into a lot of situatons where I needed fill flash (bright sunny day with a friend in the foreground and some famous scenery in the background and you want both of them to show on the picture).

I think fill flash is difficult, I have a 360fgz but I rarely use it. If I use it in wireless mode and slap a lumiquest soft box on it, then the result looks very nice, altho since its not fill flash the background is dark but the subject looks very good, unfortunateley its very hard to hold a flash with one hand and then a heavy slr in the other hand. I wish they invented some hovering technology so u can just leave your flash in thin air and it will float whereever you put it, that would be something wouldnt it.

So, how to do fill flash.... I found that if I use the flash normally, on camera. The camera will by default set the exposure to 1/60 and rely in the flash for the light. This can cause the background to be very dark. What I wanted was to have the camera measure as normal (which would mean the person standing in the foreground would be dark) and then fire the flash at reduced output to lit the person in the foreground.

I didnt find a way to do this in Av mode, so I went to manual. There I found a hack way to do it which was to turn the flash off, use the green button to meter, then turn the flash back on and fire the shot. This worked surprisingly well actually, and compared to pressing the green button while the flash was on, this way used a lot more ambient light.

Sorry, let me get down to some questions here: how do you guys do fill flash?
And, heres another issue which I thought was strange:
With the 360fgz in manual mode, I measured and took a shot indoors with flash, it was taken at 1/15 and the exposure looked good. Then I set the flash to manual mode, and turned it down as far as I could, which was 1:32, but now the same shot was overexposed. Does that mean that altho you cannot turn the flash down more than 1:32 in manual mode, it can actually fire a weaker flash in p-ttl mode?

Oh, and I figured I had to put the flash in HS mode to be able to use it more flexibly. I dont think there is that much info surrounding fill flash, other than the principle of it, but what about the camera setting specifics.

Please share some of your fill flash techniques

[*isteve]

On a recent vacation I ran into a lot of situatons where I needed fill flash (bright sunny day with a friend in the foreground and some famous scenery in the background and you want both of them to show on the picture).

I think fill flash is difficult, I have a 360fgz but I rarely use it. If I use it in wireless mode and slap a lumiquest soft box on it, then the result looks very nice, altho since its not fill flash the background is dark but the subject looks very good, unfortunateley its very hard to hold a flash with one hand and then a heavy slr in the other hand. I wish they invented some hovering technology so u can just leave your flash in thin air and it will float whereever you put it, that would be something wouldnt it.

So, how to do fill flash.... I found that if I use the flash normally, on camera. The camera will by default set the exposure to 1/60 and rely in the flash for the light. This can cause the background to be very dark. What I wanted was to have the camera measure as normal (which would mean the person standing in the foreground would be dark) and then fire the flash at reduced output to lit the person in the foreground.

I didnt find a way to do this in Av mode, so I went to manual. There I found a hack way to do it which was to turn the flash off, use the green button to meter, then turn the flash back on and fire the shot. This worked surprisingly well actually, and compared to pressing the green button while the flash was on, this way used a lot more ambient light.

Sorry, let me get down to some questions here: how do you guys do fill flash?
And, heres another issue which I thought was strange:
With the 360fgz in manual mode, I measured and took a shot indoors with flash, it was taken at 1/15 and the exposure looked good. Then I set the flash to manual mode, and turned it down as far as I could, which was 1:32, but now the same shot was overexposed. Does that mean that altho you cannot turn the flash down more than 1:32 in manual mode, it can actually fire a weaker flash in p-ttl mode?

Oh, and I figured I had to put the flash in HS mode to be able to use it more flexibly. I dont think there is that much info surrounding fill flash, other than the principle of it, but what about the camera setting specifics.

Please share some of your fill flash techniques

I think you pretty much got it - you can use it in HSS mode for fill in P Av or Tv mode but the camera will stop the shutter slowing so much you blur the background. Its also quite hard to vary the background exposure in isolation.

However in HSS and M mode you should not need to turn the flash off. The green button will give you a correct P mode exposure which you can vary as you wish. The camera will meter normally and the flash will just be used to balance exposure at the focus range.

I generally take a green button mode exposure of the background as reference. Adjust aperture to what I want and then lower/raise the shutter speed to underexpose the background by a half to one stop. I then leave it be and let the flash take care of the subject.

[and]

Steve, thanks for replying. I do need to play with this a bit more. There is also slow-sync with the built in flash, but I dont know if that will be usefull for filll flash, I used that on previous cameras for doing flash pictures at night and avoiding the background turning out as pitch black.

Seems to me M mode is the right place to do fill flash. I believe the camera gave me different exposure when I pressed the green button for the same aperature setting depending if I had the flash on or not and as I said, setting the exposure without the flash and then fiering the flash in p-ttl mode seemed to do the trick, but its annoying to turn the flash on and off.

I was wondering about the manual flash, I found that strange, if I used the flash in manual and turned it as low as I could, it was still way too powerfull and I remmeber I had to stop down to f11 in my test to balance it, its annoying that you cannot turn the flash down more than that.

I think you pretty much got it - you can use it in HSS mode for fill in P Av or Tv mode but the camera will stop the shutter slowing so much you blur the background. Its also quite hard to vary the background exposure in isolation.

However in HSS and M mode you should not need to turn the flash off. The green button will give you a correct P mode exposure which you can vary as you wish. The camera will meter normally and the flash will just be used to balance exposure at the focus range.

I generally take a green button mode exposure of the background as reference. Adjust aperture to what I want and then lower/raise the shutter speed to underexpose the background by a half to one stop. I then leave it be and let the flash take care of the subject.

[blende8]

Seems to me M mode is the right place to do fill flash. I believe the camera gave me different exposure when I pressed the green button for the same aperature setting depending if I had the flash on or not and as I said, setting the exposure without the flash and then fiering the flash in p-ttl mode seemed to do the trick, but its annoying to turn the flash on and off.

No need to do that!
Just set the camera in M to 2nd curtain.
When you now press the green button you will get the metering "without flash".
A hidden feature!

[and]

No need to do that!
Just set the camera in M to 2nd curtain.
When you now press the green button you will get the metering "without flash".
A hidden feature!

Really? Interesting, I must give that a try tomorrow. Thaks for the tip

[*isteve]

No need to do that!
Just set the camera in M to 2nd curtain.
When you now press the green button you will get the metering "without flash".
A hidden feature!

Interesting - but the same happens in HSS mode - M mode and green button gives the non-flash exposure.

[blende8]

Interesting - but the same happens in HSS mode - M mode and green button gives the non-flash exposure.

This is correct!
I am wondering if Pentax knows this?

[and]

I just did a quick and dirty test, with the camera in M mode and standing stationary on a table pointing at the same subject, I tried pressing the green button to see what kind of exposure I would get:
Flash off: 1/4
Flash on in leading, normal and trailing sync: 1/60
Flash on in HSS: 1/4

Also, interestingly eanough, putting the camera in Av mode with the same aperature as in M mode also gives 1/60, even in HSS mode.

Is this a bug?

Seems this might be a good way of doing fillflash though.

Steve: Do you find it nescesary to add some - flash comp when you do this?

[*isteve]

I just did a quick and dirty test, with the camera in M mode and standing stationary on a table pointing at the same subject, I tried pressing the green button to see what kind of exposure I would get:
Flash off: 1/4
Flash on in leading, normal and trailing sync: 1/60
Flash on in HSS: 1/4

Also, interestingly eanough, putting the camera in Av mode with the same aperature as in M mode also gives 1/60, even in HSS mode.

Is this a bug?

Seems this might be a good way of doing fillflash though.

Steve: Do you find it nescesary to add some - flash comp when you do this?

I dont think its so much a bug as just not a not very well documented feature! I generally find I need +0.5 indoors or +1 if the background is too bright or reflective. I also tend to use ISO320 - 500 most of the time to make sure I can get background detail.

Surprised that 1/32 is so bright. You must have been quite close or using it direct. Try bouncing or using a diffuser.

[*isteve]

I dont think its so much a bug as just not a not very well documented feature! I generally find I need +0.5 indoors or +1 if the background is too bright or reflective. I also tend to use ISO320 - 500 most of the time to make sure I can get background detail.

Surprised that 1/32 is so bright. You must have been quite close or using it direct. Try bouncing or using a diffuser.

If you leave the camera set to autoflash, the camera will use autoflash exposure (will stop the shutter speed slowing below the shake threshold depending on lens) unless you set the flash to HSS.

If you set the camera to Slow Synch, then it will use whatever synch mode is set on the flash (even HSS) and will meter as if no flash were attached. It will prevent you using shutter speeds about 1/180 though unless HSS is set.


I compiled a full matrix over at the "other place"

Flash settings on camera and flash: Pentax SLR Talk Forum: Digital Photography Review

[and]

Very usefull info Steve, a recommended read for anyone that wants to play with Fill Flash! Thanks a lot for that.

If you leave the camera set to autoflash, the camera will use autoflash exposure (will stop the shutter speed slowing below the shake threshold depending on lens) unless you set the flash to HSS.

If you set the camera to Slow Synch, then it will use whatever synch mode is set on the flash (even HSS) and will meter as if no flash were attached. It will prevent you using shutter speeds about 1/180 though unless HSS is set.


I compiled a full matrix over at the "other place"

Flash settings on camera and flash: Pentax SLR Talk Forum: Digital Photography Review