annoying flash issues

[Kofman13]

Since i got my d90 i was never a fan of flash and always utilized available light or used reflectors, as the only flash I have is the popup flash. I got a popup flash diffuser today which makes the flash a great deal more usable so ive been using flash all day to fill in.
My annoyances are as follows. its probably because i have almost no experience using flash:
I get my manual settings down so that the picture has pretty much perfect exposure etc, except for shadows which i will fill with flash. then i take a pic with flash and either everything else is super dark, or everything has a super orange hue, i change WB to flash setting, also to tungsten ( which is the indoor light i was shooting under this evening), still not lifelike colors.

another problem is, in some tests, my pictures WITH flash have motion blur as if i was shooting with a 1 second shutter and f/6 in a dim room. but without flash they are crisp but need fill light.
most of the shots with flash are blurrier than without, i would think if the flash lit up the subject, it would be the opposite; more crisp.

maybe ive had a long day and its time to sleep....

 

[Kofman13]

any advice?

 

[Bitter Jeweler]

I thought you were going to sleep?

Rear Curtain Sync?

 

[Derrel]

SHutter speed is too long if you are getting blurry images with flash. SHoot flash in manual exposure mode, with the shutter set to a reasonable speed, like 1/60, 1/90,1/125, or 1/160 second...the flash will make crisp images...

If the shutter is allowed to run slow, which is called "dragging the shutter", you can easily get very blurry images, with a crisp outline/crisp part of the image where the flash goes off and renders things sharply.

 

[Kofman13]

SHutter speed is too long if you are getting blurry images with flash. SHoot flash in manual exposure mode, with the shutter set to a reasonable speed, like 1/60, 1/90,1/125, or 1/160 second...the flash will make crisp images...

If the shutter is allowed to run slow, which is called "dragging the shutter", you can easily get very blurry images, with a crisp outline/crisp part of the image where the flash goes off and renders things sharply.

Thanks I'll play around with shutter speeds more. I noticed when I had shutter fast enough to reduce blur, then the environment around the subject was too dark, and had a spotlight effect. I'll try rear curtain tomorrow..