Flash!

[plonq]

atara bought me a very nice, mid-range flash for my old DSLR for Christmas this year. It is something that has been on my "would like to get some day" list for a few years, but after playing around with it this evening, I am kicking myself for not getting a new flash ages ago.

We walked up to the camera store this afternoon when I was having trouble getting it to do its wireless sync with my camera. I asked if I would need a cable, or if I needed an additional attachment for my camera to signal the remote flash. The girl at the camera store assured me that it SHOULD work with my camera, and she emailed me some links to help sites and videos. They had great pointers on how to use the various settings on the flash, but none of them addressed the issue I was having.

Eventually I figured it out on my own and got it working, but I don't know how much I will be using it as a detached flash anyway. Just being able to aim it makes a marked difference, and has breathed new life into this old camera.

She thought I was serious when I joked about upgrading my camera to match the shiny new flash, and she chastised me saying that I other than a few bells and whistles on the newer models, I was unlikely to see any improvement in picture quality. To be honest, I was partly serious when I joked about it. It is getting harder to find compatible add-ons for this camera, and the newer sensors DO perform much better in low light than this one does. Still, with the results I am seeing with the new flash, I think I will be happy with this camera for a few more years if it keeps working reliably.

For the record, I took all of these pictures using the 35mm lens (not because it is the best lens for shots like these, but because it is the least ungainly). I had the ISO locked at 100, and took them at aperture priority, set to f/5.0. In retrospect, it looks like the shutter locked itself at 1/60 to sync with the flash, so I'd have been better off just shooting at 1/60 and letting the camera pick the aperture. That would explain why they both came out a bit on the dark side. I'll take a few more shots tomorrow with the P setting and see what it does with the pictures.

In some ways, Belladonna is the most independent of the three cats. That said, if we both end up in the same room for any reason, Belladonna invariably shows up a minute or two later. She likes to keep an eye on her people. This spot under atara's lamp has become one of her favourite camping places when we are both on our computers.


I have noticed that many of the pictures I have of Merry make her look angry, or concerned. Those pictures are a bit misleading, because she is anything but an angry or concerned cat - she is a big, dumb, happy girl. This shot captures her personality better than most. See how she is staring with placid, curious fascination at something that only she can see? This is the Merry that we know and love.

Comments

[furahi.livejournal.com]

Does your camera/flash support high speed sync? If you enable it you can take pictures with faster shutter speeds
Though it doesn't look like you'd need them for those pictures

[plonq.livejournal.com]

That's a good question - something that I forgot to test last night (but which I would probably know if I actually took the time to read the manual). I played around with the settings and took some test shots this morning. This one was at 1/4000 of a second, so I feel safe in answering a tentative yes to it syncing at high speed.

(http://www.flickr.com/photos/plonq/8314613646/)

[dakhun.livejournal.com]

In these pictures where are you locating your flash and what are you aiming it at?

[plonq.livejournal.com]

I mounted it on the camera, attached the diffuser and bounced it off the ceiling.

I will work more on placement and technique later - this time out I was just working on getting it to sync with the camera, and playing with some settings.

Also I was enjoying the novelty of taking flash pictures of the cats without giving them the demon-eye effect.