From this point out, I’m changing everything. Because I can. Because I should. Because it’ll make me happier.
March, 2008:
High Speed Sync / Auto-FP
I’ve been doing some research into High Speed Sync (aka Auto FP in the Nikon world) and its effects on maximum flash distance.
Essentially, in these High Speed Sync Modes, the Flash is staying “on” (actually, it’s just pulsing really fast) for the entire time of the exposure. Despite the fact that with HSS, we’re talking about very fast shutter speeds, a usual flash duration can be even faster than that. Sometimes as fast as 1/10,000 second. Because of the way a focal plane shutter works, the faster your sync speed is, the less light from the flash is getting through the camera at any one time. This means that increasing your shutter speed by one stop effectively reduces your maximum flash output by one stop. However, as long as you are working at ranges where you are not required to use maximum flash output, this may not mean there is any change in flash intensity in your situation. With TTL metering, your camera’s brains will figure that out for you, and if you’re manually metering, you can just increase the flash intensity.
But, it’s good to know exactly what effect using HSS will have on your maximum flash distance. Of course every flash will be different depending on its output and reflector/diffuser characteristics. On average, your flash’s range will be reduced by about 1/2. However, this is largely dependent on the amount of ambient light you’re trying to balance with. I’d like to offer a real world example however, it seems that non of the primary manufacturers are producing spec sheets for HSS Flash. I have been able to find what I think is a spec sheet for the Sigma EF-500 Super DG, so, that’s what I’ll use.
A quick glance at the specs shows that engaging HSS cuts the 105mm Guide Number from 50 to 25 at 1/250s. Put another way, you lose 1 full stop of power. Or, another way, you cut your maximum flash distance in half. From that point on however, assuming you’re adjusting your aperture along with the shutter speed, the maximum distance remains basically constant. If you’d prefer some real numbers, read on.
The EF-500 Super DG has a guide number of 50m at ISO 100 when zoomed to 105mm. On a bright sunny day, we know that proper exposure would be f/16 for 1/100 second. To exactly match this with our flash, we’d need our subject to be 3.125m away. Adjusting our shutter speed to 1/250 (a common sync speed limit) leaves us with an aperture of f/10 and a distance of 5m. Now, let’s say we really want to shoot at f/5.6, proper ambient light exposure would require a shutter speed of 1/800. Here’s where things start to change. Our flash has a guide number of 14.0 at 1/800 and zoom at 105mm. At f/5.6 our range is only 2.5 meters, or 1/2 of what it was at 1/250. In other words, if we were using our flash at MAXIMUM power before going into high speed sync, the only way to widen the aperture would be to bring the flash closer to the subject by 1/2 which isn’t exactly what we’re going for here. To continue the exercise, however, let’s say we actually want to shoot at f/4 now. That would be a shutter speed of 1/1600 to match ambient light. Our flash has a guide number of 9.9 at 1/1600 and zoomed to 105mm. This gives us a maximum range of 2.475 meters. Not quite the 2.5m we had before, but not nearly as bad a bite as our first initial hit.
Now let’s imagine we aren’t working at maximum range to begin with. Let’s go back to our original scenario but let’s put our subject at a distance of 2 meters. Before engaging HSS, we’re shooting at f/10 and 1/250 just like before. At f/10 and our subject at 2 meters our flash is more powerful than we need and we’d have to decrease the power in order to maintain this aperture. Now, to get an aperture of f/5.6 we decrease our shutter speed to 1/800, just like before. Our maximum distance of the flash just like before is 2.5 meters at 1/800. We’re still well within range of our subject however, if we are manually adjusting the flash output, we will have to turn it up some since we’re closer to our maximum than we were before. Now, taking the final step from before, we’re shooting at f/4 and 1/1600. Our maximum distance is 2.475 meters which means, again, we won’t have to get any closer to our subject and will simply have to increase the flash power a little if setting it manually. In fact, as long as we intend to keep the same overall ambient exposure, once we take that initial hit, our distance is basically unaffected.
Special thanks to Michael Moore, an incredible wedding photographer from Ontario, Canada, for pointing me in the right direction.
camping this weekend
Jess and I are thinking about going camping this weekend. Somewhere close to home as a sort of trial run for camping with the baby. It’s supposed to get down as low as 40F or maybe even 35F so some of you can just stop reading now.
We’re looking at one of the following parks in order of highest probability: Ray Roberts, Eisenhower, Cooper Lake, Lake Mineral Wells. These have been chosen because they are within a 2 hour drive and offer hiking trails as well as drive-up camp sites. Chime in if you happen to like one of these parks more than the others.
We will arrive sometime Saturday morning and leave by 11am on Sunday. Depending on what my parents decide for their own weekend plans we will either then go have an easter dinner with them or we’ll be moving a fish and then watching Jesus suck the blood out of perfectly healthy people. Or, if camping was absolutely terrible with the baby, we may just go home and collapse and never leave the house again. I can only make promises regarding Saturday morning.
Let me know if you’re interested and I’ll keep you posted with the details.
Radio Popper
Radio Popper is the new kid on the block when it comes to wireless radio strobe triggers. In fact, they are so new you can’t even buy the product just yet. But, when you can, the promise the difference will worth the wait. And I, for one, believe them.
There are basically two product types Radio Popper is offering. The first provides wireless TTL flash. Yes, you probably already have this if you have modern equipment and mated flashes. However, you don’t have it like this. With the exception of 1 or 2 very expensive 3rd party options, to my knowledge, all of the big names in camera technology handle wireless TTL flash using IR. This works great if all of your flashes are close by and you have a line of sight to each of them. When you don’t, or if things change, this fails drastically. Radio Popper is changing that. You’ll still need your modern equipment and mated flashes. Radio Popper will sit in between your camera and those flashes and retransmit those IR signals over RF. This means that, suddenly, they’ll work through walls, behind your subjects, when not visible to the camera, and from very far away — up to 500 feet away. To my knowledge there is currently no other product that does this in this way and, when considering all options, no product that does this in such an inexpensive way. The cost is $175-$225 per transmitter or receiver. You’ll need one transmitter for the camera and a receiver for every flash you intend to use.
The second product being offered by Radio Popper has been on the market for quite some time. Radio Popper is just doing it cheaper and better. For photographers looking for wireless flash triggers who don’t need the TTL features, there have been three options on the market before now.
First, the expensive PocketWizard. They can fire both strobes and camera, work from a great distance, and fire every time. These are standard equipment for many photographers. They run $180-$300 per transmitter or receiver.
Second, is the dirt cheap eBay and Gadget Infinity Radio Slaves. They fire strobes, work for about 300-500 feet, and fire about 80-90% of the time depending on closeness and batteries. These are standard equipment for most amateur photographers and those who aren’t willing to plunk down the PocketWizard cash. They run $15-$25 per transmitter or receiver.
Third, is the middle ground. Lots of manufacturers have made products ranging from $50-$150 per transmitter or receiver that falls somewhere in between the functionality and the reliability of the above two options. I know of very few people actually using them, however.
Piggybacking off the requirements and research for the Wireless TTL model above, Radio Popper will be offering a non TTL variety capable of a 2000 ft range and promising much fewer misses than that “eBay Radio Slaves” for $25 per transmitter or receiver. With this, the usability, affordability, and reliability of this product will have all jumped leaps and bounds.
Finally, even if you aren’t a fan of wireless TTL, the wireless TTL version will be capable of syncing at very high shutter speeds which means that overpowering the sun just got a lot more possible.
Products are slated for release in the Summer of 2008. I’m counting the days.
not a good day
I took today off as well knowing I would want to spend some time with Jess and Celeste to make up for the weekend as well as getting my bags unpacked, all my equipment cleaned, and my images at least mostly processed. It’s not starting off well.
First, I realized that my mobile blogging method wasn’t working and, what’s worse, that it was leaving HUGE posts filled with gibberish in my journal. I still haven’t figured out why it broke or what it’s trying to do. I think I’m giving up.
I’m also fighting with metadata between the 3 different applications involved with managing my large photograph collection. Lightroom isn’t always updating the XMP on disk, my other applications are expecting that it will, there’s constant conflict between the two, and everything is just not fun.
On top of that, I think my data/backup drive enclosures are screwy. I’m regularly having to unmount them, power cycle the enclosures, and then remount the drives to get them to be responsive. I’ve also seen a few bits of corrupted data here and there. Not good.
Once these problems start to weigh on me, all the problems I’ve already pushed aside start to show their face in my mind again.
I need to get to Wolf and get my long lens repaired. Without it, I don’t have one.
Somehow, another of my commonly used lenses managed to break yesterday as well. The zoom ring no longer functions. Thankfully, I have two prime lenses and a wide angle zoom that I can use in place of this lens, though it isn’t as convenient. I need to contact Sigma/Competitive Camera and see if it’s still under warranty from Sigma and, if so, see if this damage is covered. I can’t think of anything I could have done to it to cause this. It must just be bad luck.
While I really like the backpack I bought for this past weekend, it’s too large and too rigid for my uses as a daypack/travel pack. I end up keeping 80% of my gear attached to the straps and belt of the backpack and the actual pack itself remains mostly empty. Lugging around a huge backpack that’s mostly empty is just silly. It’d be great for a warm weather overnighter, so it might be worth holding on to. I’m just not sure. I might have to go back to REI and see if I can find something else I’d prefer.
Jess and I were supposed to take Celeste for a nice walk by the lake early this morning, but Jess isn’t awake yet and I don’t have the heart to wake her myself. Even if she was awake, I don’t know if I could pull myself from this data nightmare knowing it was left in this very vulnerable state.
I hate it when all these little things just stack up until I feel like I’m going to collapse.
Friday Recap
(due to a glitch in my mobile blogging software you’re just seeing this now. It was originally posted on 2008-03-15 at 5:48am)
Left decatur around 8am. Arrived at hotel around 2PM. Lots of stops along the way.
After getting situated in the hotel, we went to the canyon. Half of the group hiked down into it and photographed a broken building as well as the views from the cliffs.
Then we hit Cadillac ranch which was crazy, and hilarious, and yet very cool. I might go back there tonight and try to light it up with strobes.
Then we had dinner with some Amarillo photographers. There were 19 of us in total. Met a really nice guy named mark. Got back to the hotel around 10:45 and crashed.
We’re meeting mark this morning at 8am in the canyon. He’s going to help us draw out some wild turkeys and some deer to photograph. Then around 10am we’re going to hit a trail Mark told us about instead of doing the guided tour like planned. Then we’re going to get a quick lunch then hit the lighthouse trail. Then we’ll do some driving around, then dinner, then maybe Cadillac ranch again.
All in all, a good day for yesterday and an awesome day planned for today.
It’s Sunday
(due to a glitch in my mobile blogging software, you’re just now seeing this. It was originally posted on 2008-03-16 at 8:15am)
Aside from the aforementioned broken lens, yesterday was awesome.
I photographed wild turkeys and even managed to get a tom to eat right out of my hand.
I saw lots of beautiful birds and even got to photograph them thanks to a kind soul from the amarillo photography society for lending me a nice long lens. I don’t think Jess is going to like him too much since he pretty much sold me on getting some even longer glass. We’ll see what the photos look like.
We made the 6 mile trek in to the lighthouse rock and back. It was beautiful we even managed to catch the moonrise on our way out which made for some great photos. I’m a bit sun-fried this morning since I didn’t wear any sunscreen, but it’s nothing too bad.
Most of the day, including the walk to the lighthouse rock, was spent a couple of amarillo area photographers including a 75ish year old man who could easily run circles around me both in hiking and in landscape photography. He even brought a fully restored corvair for us all to marvel at. What a great guy. I hope to keep in touch with him via email.
Here in a bit we’ll be heading out for Dallas with a planned stop at caprock canyon state park. I hear they have some beautiful trails there and I’m really looking forward to it.
Email, text messages and phone should all now work again, thanks to being out of the canyon. More later…
Early Morning C-SPAN
(due to a glitch in my mobile blogging method, you’re just seeing this now. It was originally posted on 2008-03-15 at 6:15am)
I’ve never watched C-SPAN this early in the morning but… Is this program for real? There’s a guy reading news articles directly out of various newspapers. The camera shows his hands holding the article he’s reading. The interesting passages are highlighted and he moves his pen across the page pointing at the words he’s reading.
Really? That’s a program? I’m in the wrong business.
