Submitting 1st picture after getting my 20D

Tamron SP AF 28-75mm f/2.8 XR Di for Canon

10/01/2005 09:54:25 PM · #1

This is the first picture I'm submitting since I got my 20D. What do you think?

//usera.imagecave.com/pianomom2003/Casey/IMG_0023editedcropped.jpg

Message edited by author 2005-10-01 22:01:04.

philup

Canon EOS-5D

10/01/2005 10:15:37 PM · #2

nice picture...Im thinking about getting a 20d myself..do you like yours?

Canon EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM

10/01/2005 10:16:49 PM · #3

Yes, I do like it. Seems to be a great camera. I've only had it around a week though, so I'm still learning how to use it.

eschelar

Canon EOS-7D

10/01/2005 10:42:48 PM · #4

Try resizing that picture and play with some options to make sure you keep all that fine detail.

Regarding the picture itself, it looks really great, but the use of the flash leaves a little to be desired. Remember, the goal when using the flash it to make it look like you have used none.

petrakka

10/01/2005 11:05:51 PM · #5

Originally posted by eschelar:

I'd disagree, although this may sometimes be the goal, often a flash can make your subject pop from the b/g just a little bit, and its evident that you used a flash. here is an example in which i used 2 flashes and underexposed the b/g by a stop.

shot details are 1/500 f4 fujichrome velvia 50 shot on yashicamat 124g camera

//www.phdmidcoast.com/sport/frontsidebs.jpg

i think that dog photo without the flash wouldnt look so nice, although a flash off the camera would look nicer. looks like my moms dog =)

Message edited by author 2005-10-01 23:08:08.

eschelar

Canon EOS-7D

Canon EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM

10/02/2005 01:01:24 PM · #6

Yeah, what Petrakka said. The use of the flash leaves a little to be desired. That doesn't mean it's terrible with the flash.

I guess what I should have said is that this use of the flash didn't feel natural to me, giving it that kind of "Disposable Camera FlashPOP" kind of feel. Flash units on upper end cameras are really good and I just felt that the way it was used made it look a little like it wasn't right. Maybe this is because the camera was too close. I don't really know. I'm not an expert. I'm just trying to give my feeling on the picture. Flash has it's place and most people who really know what they are doing with a camera can tell when a flash is used.

So I'll change my statement to: Usually, the goal when using a flash is to make it look like you used none or that the lighting is natural. There are other styles to use, but I don't feel that this picture fell under other categories, so there may be other choices you can make in the flash department to make this picture look better. Particularly in using external flash units or other forms of lighting.

The point is the same: Please take some time to consider different lighting choices.

Canon EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM

10/02/2005 01:59:46 PM · #7

At least she doesn't have red eyes! lol

"i think that dog photo without the flash wouldnt look so nice, although a flash off the camera would look nicer. looks like my moms dog =)"

Unfortunately, I don't have an off the camera flash, just the one on the camera. I thought it's supposed to be a good thing to catch a little of the light in the eyes to make them stand out more, etc. But hey, we're all learning here, right?

Message edited by author 2005-10-02 14:00:13.

eschelar

Canon EOS-7D

10/03/2005 01:21:41 PM · #8

It is supposed to be a good thing to get catchlights. I think what is being referred to here is the evenness of the light and the placement and prominence of the shadow. Getting catchlights has more to do with controlling the direction of a source of light rather than the majority of the light. Balancing the light in a picture is much more complicated. I did a fun experiment today with this. I grabbed a 2 year old chinese girl with HUGE black eyes that is my bosses daughter and gave her a little "airplane ride" while I ulteriorly watched the reflections in her irises from different light sources.

If you want to make your picture look better, find ways of balancing your light that aren't reliant on your on-camera flash. Then you can be free to use the on-camera flash to add catchlights without throwing off the rest of the lighting.

I would imagine you know this already, but other flash uses include (not exclusively): increasing light contrast between subject and background to make it black, filling in foreground when background lighting is too strong, adding shadows to provide texture and depth to a subject.

Many situations for these purposes call for off-camera flashes.

My friends who shoot weddings usually take at least one external flash unit, and as I'm doing things on the cheap myself, I figured it wouldn't be too terrible to buy myself a little slave flash unit that's set up for recent digital cameras with multiple pre-flashes and which has a single manual setting governing the strength/flash duration that has both a flash detector (for firing) and a thyristor for when it's mounted to the side mount. It's totally cheap and a little silly compared to a 580EX with wireless control, but it only cost me around 35 dollar US and has given me a great place to start. (honestly, I haven't actually used it to take any shots yet, but I got it fairly recently and don't actually take a lot of pictures using flash)

It takes a lot of getting used to, but I can set it up to get a fairly reliable and predictable amount of light, and I can hand-hold it wirlessly. All I have to do it set up a mirror of some sort in front of my flash and I can use it instead of my on-camera flash.

Check it out to see if you can get something that matches the flash profile of your 20D for cheap like that. It will get you started and you probably won't regret it if you like to use flash.

Photographically, my current area of learning is on how to control light and choose light. My current level of ability is just a hair over "A pathetic joke", but I'm also learning. Every month or so I get an hour or so of time to chat (Typically without a camera in hand) with an ex-pro friend of mine and he loads me up with a bunch of facts and I go and find ways to learn about them hands-on.

His big thing for me to do is trying to find ways of using more constant light sources like lamps and reflectors and big sheets of paper and bedsheets hung over string.... Doing this, you will be able to control your light much more effectively because you can see it in real time.

He cringes when I tell him I use fluorescent table lamps!

I hope there's something useful you can pull out of my inexperienced ramblings :)