Is There A Cheat Sheet for External Flash Settings?

[PeK77]

I've been working to learn how to effectively use a new SB-700 external flash and don't have alot of time due to kids, work, etc..... Everybody recommends http://Strobist.blogspot.com however it doesn't seem to have any guidance on strategies for shooting a scene after the pages where it suggests exactly what to buy. It does seem to have a series of exercises but never explains where to start when planning to shoot a scene. Am I missing something?

While I can understand the concept of "experimenting" to learn, I don't see this as effective or efficient.

I read an article on bouncing flash indoors that provided starting F#s and exposure speed and it was great. The article has significantly improved my photography indoors as I jotted down the started settings and use them as a starting point. Before this article, I would get blown out photos (not exactly understanding the settings in the flash) and less than stellar results. While I'm still not getting it perfectly, my results are much better. I'd like to shoot manually.

Is there a resource that provides "cheat sheets" for different starting settings? Sunlight behind subjects at sundown, How to get a night shot, kid portrait settings...group portraits, things like this. The flash settings are so complicated (between distance, the internal camera settings, f stops on the flash) that it would seem like a cheat sheet like this would make sense. It would be great if there was a starting sheet and then gave info on what to change to brighten or darken the background or the flash lit subject. In the long term, I hope to buy a seminar or something...but for now does a cheat sheet like this exist?

Since this a beginner section, ideally the lessons would focus on a single flash vs. multiple. Most online tutorials seem to focus on 2 or more.

 

[pgriz]

The "cheat sheet" is the knowledge of how the flash, the camera, and the light works together. Sorry - the equivalent of what you're asking is saying that you want to know what temperature to set the oven at - the answer is "it depends" on the food being cooked, the quantity of it, the moisture content, etc. However, there are in essence three principles that affect flash photography: 1) the inverse-square law of light intensity, 2) the knowledge that a flash photo is actually two exposures sharing the aperture as the common element, and 3) the bigger the apparent light source, the softer the shadow transition. There are, of course, lots of other pesky details as well, but if you get those three figured out and internalized, you've gone a very long way down the flash turnpike.

 

[hirejn]

The reason there's no cheat sheet -- for example, start at ISO 100, f/8, distance of 10 feet -- is because every flash may not put out the same duration of light at a given power setting. For example, a studio strobe at full power is not the same as a speedlight at full power, and an SB-910 at full power isn't necessarily putting out the same as an SB-300 at full power. To develop a cheat sheet, you need a lot of experience. For example, noted wedding photographer Cliff Mautner knows that at a distance of 10 feet from the subject, at a given ISO, he needs to set the flash at a certain power, like 1/4. This is due to years of experience. The best cheat sheet, however, is in your head. If you need to look at an actual sheet, you might as well just use a light meter and get it exact, or TTL.

The problem with a cheat sheet is there's no sheet for creativity. For example, I look at a scene and know my ISO and decide creatively what aperture I want to achieve my vision, but I'll use a light meter to calculate the flash I want, or TTL. There's no sheet for that. It comes from my experience and knowledge. What I recommend is learning the principles of lighting and then practicing them and experimenting with them so you understand how they work. There's a lot to it. It will be much harder if you haven't already mastered basic exposure and photography techniques.

 

[tirediron]

Learning about Guide Numbers will help a lot.

 

[ronlane]

Learning about Guide Numbers will help a lot.

learn, learn, learn. You know this business would be so much easier if you'd just come shoot it for me and give me the images and the money

 

[PeK77]

The reason there's no cheat sheet -- for example, start at ISO 100, f/8, distance of 10 feet -- is because every flash may not put out the same duration of light at a given power setting. For example, a studio strobe at full power is not the same as a speedlight at full power, and an SB-910 at full power isn't necessarily putting out the same as an SB-300 at full power. To develop a cheat sheet, you need a lot of experience. For example, noted wedding photographer Cliff Mautner knows that at a distance of 10 feet from the subject, at a given ISO, he needs to set the flash at a certain power, like 1/4. This is due to years of experience. The best cheat sheet, however, is in your head. If you need to look at an actual sheet, you might as well just use a light meter and get it exact, or TTL.

The problem with a cheat sheet is there's no sheet for creativity. For example, I look at a scene and know my ISO and decide creatively what aperture I want to achieve my vision, but I'll use a light meter to calculate the flash I want, or TTL. There's no sheet for that. It comes from my experience and knowledge. What I recommend is learning the principles of lighting and then practicing them and experimenting with them so you understand how they work. There's a lot to it. It will be much harder if you haven't already mastered basic exposure and photography techniques.

I understand exposure and basic photography techniques, I just don't know how to incorporate manual exposure settings with flash settings. I understand the creativity issue and that a cheat sheet will not allow for that. There must be an easier way to figure it out....almost like an A, B, C, D process to figure out how it works.

I think I'm going to try to find some type of video series or seminar on flash in general.

 

[kathyt]

Read the flash manual. For real. It works. Then fill in the blanks with videos.

 

[pgriz]

If you're using manual exposure, and you're trying to get the flash to contribute, the first question is whether it is on camera or not. If on-camera, then the camera's ETTL (or whatever the Nikon equivalent is) is a decent way to go. If off-camera, then adjusting the power level to give you the proper exposure is the technique you'll have to learn. This applies whether you're bouncing or modifying the flash. I've found that my time to get the "proper" power level setting is much improved with a flash meter. It's possible to do this without a flash-meter, but takes quite a few more test exposures before it's all dialed in.

 

[ronlane]

Wouldn't using a light meter help you with all of this? They can be bought for under $300 and tell you what is needed for proper exposure.

Am I over simplifying this issue or question?

 

[PeK77]

Wouldn't using a light meter help you with all of this? They can be bought for under $300 and tell you what is needed for proper exposure.

Am I over simplifying this issue or question?

If it would simplify with the process I'll check it out. Using natural light seems much simpler... ha ha ha.

 

[pgriz]

Let me respond to your OP. When I’m shooting a static scene (still life, or portraits, or a room interior), it is feasible to use manual flash, since the subject isn’t moving around and changing the subject/flash distance.
Let’s assume I’m shooting a room during the day, with the windows showing the bright outdoors. Inside, it’s a lot darker, so it’s hard to get a single exposure that will properly light the inside AND allow the outside to show good detail. To fix this, I will use a flash to add enough light inside to allow me to show the outside (through the window) at a “normal” tone.

We’ll assume an exposure for the outside that is 1/500 sec. f/8, ISO 100. I’m shooting a wide-angle and at f/8 I’ll have enough DOF to get everything in the room sharp. If I meter the inside, I’ll get something like 1/15 at f/8, ISO 100. That’s 5 stops darker than the outside. So, I need to add enough light to make the two exposure closer to each other. That’s where the flash comes in. Now I also want the room to look like it is “naturally” lit, and our brain tells us that the inside should be darker than the outside. In photographic terms, that means that the inside exposure should be about 1 to 1 ½ stops darker than the outside. To give the feeling that the light is “natural” I will bounce the flash off the white wall behind me, because I want the photons to spread themselves evenly around the room.

Let’s say I don’t have my flash meter. So the first test shot I will make will shoot the flash at full power. But because my sync speed is 1/250 sec, I need to change my manual exposure to 1/250sec, f/11, ISO 100. First test shot – inside is too bright, but not overwhelmingly so. Next try, I will reduce the flash power to ¼ power (that’s 2 stops), and see what the result is. We’re getting there, but the inside is as bright as the outside. Reduce the flash power to 1/8 power. Now the inside is about 1 stop darker than the outside. You get the sense that you’re “inside” by the amount of light. Good. We’ve arrived where I want to be.

Another scenario I commonly encounter, is that I am shooting something in bright sunshine, and the object of interest is partly in the sun and partly in the shade. Essentially, I need to put enough light into the shadows that the detail there is within 2 stops of the full-sun exposure. For this purpose, I use my flash on the hotshoe, and shoot directly at the subject. I set the camera on E-TTL and let the camera figure out the correct amount of light. However, I also want the shadows to look like the shadows, just with detail. So I set the flash’s exposure compensation to -1 ½ stop, which will nicely fill in the shadows, but still leaves them looking like shadows.

This should give you an idea of the workflow that I follow and the thinking behind the decisions I make when using flash in combination with ambient light.

 

[tirediron]

Learning about Guide Numbers will help a lot.

learn, learn, learn. You know this business would be so much easier if you'd just come shoot it for me and give me the images and the money

You want me to quote you a rate on that?

 

[ronlane]

Learning about Guide Numbers will help a lot.

learn, learn, learn. You know this business would be so much easier if you'd just come shoot it for me and give me the images and the money

You want me to quote you a rate on that?

You've done that for me before

 

[craigdhd]

I'm no expert but went through a similar thought process recently and this is what I worked out. Scott Robert Lim has a flash exposure cheat sheet which i saw on one of his creative live seminars and is a good starting point. You would be best to test and tailor it to the settings of your own flash as output varies and retest with your different modifiers to see how they affect power, however it can be seen here.

The problem with the cheat sheet however is that light is cumulative so if there's more than one light source you're not exposing only for the flashes output and would effectively have to subtract the ambient lights value from the flash exposure to get the correct value. To get the exposure right requires knowledge of the exposure triangle, knowledge of your own flash, knowledge of inverse square law and an understanding that you have at least 2 exposures to work out not 1. This means the cheat sheet at best will only tell you what your flash exposure should be for a key light on your main subject based on camera settings or your camera setting based on flashes output. It won't relate to what flash settings in sunset or backlit, vs front lit etc.

Read the strobist site as regardless of a cheat sheet you need to understand following key points:
1. Flash exposure is controlled by aperture
2. Ambient exposure is controlled by shutter speed
3. Light intensity decreases by 2 stops with each doubling of light to subject distance. ie. if flash exposure is at 1/16th power at 3ft away from subject, then if the light was 6ft away you would need to increase the power by 2 stops taking it to 1/4 power, this is what is referred to as the inverse square law.

If shooting from an exposure giving no ambient light the flash chart will be pretty accurate, especially if you adjust it by testing the output of your own flash. If mixing flash with ambient light there will always be a bit of trial and error as your adding additional light. I found when starting out you can use aperture or shutter priority to work out what you want your ambient exposure to be whilst keeping it under the cameras sync speed and then switch to manual put and use the cheat sheet to get a good idea of the starting point for your flash but it'll still take some tweaking to get right. I'm hoping the more I do it I'll eventually get better, but at least your sb700 has ttl if you need to get closer instantly.

 

[PeK77]

I'm no expert but went through a similar thought process recently and this is what I worked out. Scott Robert Lim has a flash exposure cheat sheet which i saw on one of his creative live seminars and is a good starting point. You would be best to test and tailor it to the settings of your own flash as output varies and retest with your different modifiers to see how they affect power, however it can be seen here.

The problem with the cheat sheet however is that light is cumulative so if there's more than one light source you're not exposing only for the flashes output and would effectively have to subtract the ambient lights value from the flash exposure to get the correct value. To get the exposure right requires knowledge of the exposure triangle, knowledge of your own flash, knowledge of inverse square law and an understanding that you have at least 2 exposures to work out not 1. This means the cheat sheet at best will only tell you what your flash exposure should be for a key light on your main subject based on camera settings or your camera setting based on flashes output. It won't relate to what flash settings in sunset or backlit, vs front lit etc.

Read the strobist site as regardless of a cheat sheet you need to understand following key points:
1. Flash exposure is controlled by aperture
2. Ambient exposure is controlled by shutter speed
3. Light intensity decreases by 2 stops with each doubling of light to subject distance. ie. if flash exposure is at 1/16th power at 3ft away from subject, then if the light was 6ft away you would need to increase the power by 2 stops taking it to 1/4 power, this is what is referred to as the inverse square law.

If shooting from an exposure giving no ambient light the flash chart will be pretty accurate, especially if you adjust it by testing the output of your own flash. If mixing flash with ambient light there will always be a bit of trial and error as your adding additional light. I found when starting out you can use aperture or shutter priority to work out what you want your ambient exposure to be whilst keeping it under the cameras sync speed and then switch to manual put and use the cheat sheet to get a good idea of the starting point for your flash but it'll still take some tweaking to get right. I'm hoping the more I do it I'll eventually get better, but at least your sb700 has ttl if you need to get closer instantly.

I just did a search on Scott Robert Lim and his seminar Crazy Stupid Light. Is this something you'd recommend? It is available on his website.

Also - is there a seminar anybody would recommend that I could buy on video?