Flash and DoF and background questions

Please bear with me. This is a picture from the 5th roll of film I've ever shot from a real camera. I've got some learnin' to do, and I hope you can help.



This was taken with a Rebel Ti with a 420 EX flash bouncing off the white ceiling. The camera was set to Auto mode, so 1/90", f/4.5 at about 65mm. I was about 4 feet away. The photo's cropped, but otherwise untouched and no color/exposure corrections on the scan.

I see three things I'd like to correct. His face is too bright, only his head is in focus, and I'd like to get the background darker. The DoF calculator says that I'd have to be at f/22 to get him all in focus, which would mean a 1/6" shutter speed. That seem right? With a cat, I'm not sure he'd stay still for that long. And with the flash bounced, I don't know why his face is so bright.

If you see more problems, yell out! I'm far too new at this to be hurt.




This one needs a lot of work. Black cat on a predominantly white background. Hmmm.... Lotsa work needed here.

Any hints or tips appreciated.

 

The red x's seemed to be exposed fine

I tried to copy/paste the url but got page cannot be displayed

 

I accidentally put in my internal address, not visible to the world. It should be OK now.

 

still don't see photos....

 

And finally I remembered to change the firewall ruleset....

 

You'll want to use a faster shutter speed to darken the background. To do that you'll have to go manual and set your aperture and shutter speeds yourself.

Did you have the pop up flash disabled (if there is one)? Looks like maybe it fired in a reduced power mode.

You'll need to use a smaller aperture to get the whole cat in focus. Depending on what lens you're using it might be hard to do at that distance.

For the black cat you'll probably have to expose for the bed spread and up your EV compensation to around +2 or so. You'll have to play around to get it right.

Popular Photography & Imaging magazine (Sept 03) had a great article on fill flash that would be worth reading.

Jim

 

i dont have anything to add, but those are some cute kittys

 

out of curiosity, how come you want the whole cat in focus? maybe it's a personal thing, but i think the depth of field looks alright the way it is. i'd maybe even make it shallower myself. oh well. to each their own, right?

 

Photobug: I was using a 420EX flash on this, bouncing off the ceiling. But it looks reduced to you? To me it looks like the face got too much flash.

Dew: The kitties would thank you, I'm sure. However, I dare not tell them, as it may swell their egos even more.

Carlita: I played a bit in PS and I do believe you're right. Now to achieve the effect directly...

 

I agree. Just make sure the eyes are sharp.

 

I agree, it looks like too much flash, but i was wondering if there's a pop-up flash that fired as well. If not, you might try going manual mode on the flash and crank it down and see what that does for you.

Not being familiar with your setup I can't really do much but guess & that's always a dangerous thing!

Jim

 

Looks to me like the flash spilled onto the cats face. It's too frontal to be just ceiling bounce. Maybe you should have flagged the flash to make sure none of the light from the flash hit him directly.
Cute cat though!