How to: flash and burn

[JerBear]

If I was shooting a large, dimly lit room with no main subject, would you use a larger aperture? I can see the logic in your setup for shooting subjects, but what if you were just shooting a room?

Add to that another situation, where I want to shoot a room toward large view windows and be able to see clearly outside, how would you handle that?

Thanks,

JM

[Agata]

Thank You, this was very helpful. I can't wait to try it out! :-)

[jdepould]

Originally Posted by JerBear

If I was shooting a large, dimly lit room with no main subject, would you use a larger aperture? I can see the logic in your setup for shooting subjects, but what if you were just shooting a room?

Add to that another situation, where I want to shoot a room toward large view windows and be able to see clearly outside, how would you handle that?

Thanks,

JM

I would never use a wide aperture to shoot a room like that, since depth of field would be critical. The concept really isn't any different if you take the people out. You're still balancing ambient and artificial light. Tripods aren't optional for this kind of thing. Just use a longer shutter speed or crank the strobes.

As far as being able to see outside, you're still balancing for ambient, but you'll need more power on the strobes to get the interior to match daylight. That sort of thing would require careful metering and multiple lights, depending on the size of the room. Your other option there is an HDR merge.

[snapdragon]

I am just reading the manual for my 580EXll speedlite , this thread sure explains alot that a newbie like me never knew . Great info and I can't wait to try some of these things .