D600 + SB800, auto ISO, minimum shutter speed?

I have my camera set up with auto ISO to a max of 6400 and a minimum shutter speed of 1/125. D600 with aperture priority, SB800 with TTL FP. The shutter speed says 1/60 on this overcast day here inside the house. It's currently on ISO 400 and F5.6. Camera exposure compensation is not set and flash compensation was before set to -0.7 but now I changed it to 0 but it is still saying 1/60 F5.6 and ISO 400.

 

It is also saying slow rear flash.

The other day I was doing a friend's 21st, I just shot in shutter priority at 1/125.....

 

What gives? Any advice? Cheers.

 

Edit. Without changing my camera. I dettach the SB800 and the camera settings now say F5.6, 1/125 and ISO 2200. This was a couple of minutes later around the sun set time but indoors with this white overcast day.

Edited November 17, 2018 by RaymondC

I have also taken rear slow flash off. SB800 is still attached. But the camera won't go higher than ISO 400. I have checked, Auto ISO is set to ie max 6400. Auto ISO is enabled. If I select a diff aperture value in A mode or a different shutter value in S mode, the exposure indicator will just lean towards the negative side.

 

Only way to not use auto ISO and to shoot in shutter priority or manual? I am looking for automation with people and events.

Zero Nikon experience but

Only way to not use auto ISO and to shoot in shutter priority or manual

sounds right! (At least with the stuff I am familiar with)

How is your camera supposed to know what you are after? i.e. AFAIK they don't have a chance to figure out what you are doing with your flash (bounce? - direct?) or what evil you want to live with. (Noise? vs. recharge time.)

Auto everything will keep the camera playing safe in grandma mode and assuming "he turned on the flash, so he is out of available light desperado mood and wants a clean image"- Would be interesting to see if it cranks up the ISO the get along with the 100% flash output on a too distant subject.

 

BTW: I would not go for shutter priority. - Better pick a (artistically, not lighting wise) suitable aperture by hand. But yes, do the guide number math in the back of your head to get along with your flash power. - TTL is just there to prevent (extreme) flash overexposure.

I was wanting to set auto ISO with a exposure compensation perhaps - for the ambient. select the aperture value i wanted with a min shutter speed and then just let the ISO bounce up and down .... while using TTL flash with flash compensation when required.

Have you tried M (manual) mode with auto ISO? Flash exposure compensation will let you balance the flash fill and regular exposure compensation will still control the overall exposure.

There is setting for longest shutter speed used when using flash. Usually on Nikon bodies setting range is 1/60 - 30s. If You are keen on 1/125, use S program or M.

I found the rule for aperture, shutter speed and ISO (with auto ISO on) is too confusing. So whenever I shoot flash I put the camera on manual.

Hapien has it right. There's a separate menu option for flash-synch speed, and as soon as you attach a powered-on flash, that overrides the ambient light settings.

 

Also the Auto-ISO is changed by the camera 'knowing' that you have a flash attached, and that a crazily high ISO isn't needed. I don't recollect seeing any camera menu option to change that, but why would you?

 

If you really want to use ISO 6400 with flash (say to illuminate a mountain 2 miles away at night), then there's always manual ISO selection. For most indoor situations, 400 ISO plus an SB-800 would be enough.:cool:

Edited November 17, 2018 by rodeo_joe|1

There is a setting to specify the flash shutter speed, it is set to 1/60 which is the highest.

 

Maybe I had the min shutter speed with high ISO set lower before. Now I try it - it does do a 1/125 which I have set with my Auto ISO. But the camera is still capped to ISO 400. With A mode - it is limited to ISO 400 and will just underexpose the shot. If I put it in S mode and select a higher shutter speed, again ISO 400 and it underexposes.

 

Yes, I found that maybe shoot in M mode with TTL flash. I will also need to don't use Auto ISO. With M mode it is still capped to Auto ISO 400.

 

What I get with social function is that there is this large room with 80 guests. Auto ISO with the flash caps at 400, so the background and the other tables behind will be underexposed.

 

Edit. I can confirm. There is a flash shutter speed in the menu - this only kicks in when you don't have Auto ISO set. If you set the flash shutter speed as 1/15 and Auto ISO min shutter say 1/125. It will always use 1/125. When Auto ISO is turned off then it will use 1/15. But again with a speedlight, Auto ISO won't go higher than 400.

I have used both an SB600 and SB800 with my D600, and I've not had issues setting whatever ISO I want. I almost always use aperture priority.

 

With that said, I've never used auto ISO-is there any particular reason why you're insisting on using it?

Auto ISO - one step less to think about. Sometimes you are shooting towards diff sides of the room with different lightening conditions. Ie the stage and then the tables. I want to capture the moment and think less about operating the camera.

 

Yes, just tried. Without Auto ISO, if I set ISO 1600 that is what the flash would use.

 

Question for you guys - if you have a dark room, say 10 dinner tables. Would you use a high ISO with the flash or would you limit yourself to ISO 400 (underexpose the ambient) and then the flash? Wouldn't the back be underexposed unless you have somewhere to bounce the flash. Often I find the ceilings are brown color.

If I'm using flash, I prefer it to be the main source of light these days. Even 10 years ago, you could reliably predict for tungsten or fluorescent and gel the flash for it, but now it's hard to say what kind of mixed lighting you'll encounter. Dragging the shutter can lead to some nasty and unpredictable mixed color results.

 

Some folks will roll their eyes at this, but I still like my Metz hammerheads for a reason. My 76 MZ-5 gives full iTTL(along with iTTL) and is about two stops brighter than an SB-800...and the SB-800 is not appreciably different in output from any older(SB-28) or newer(SB-900, SB-5000) Nikon high end shoe mount flashes.

Auto ISO - one step less to think about. Sometimes you are shooting towards diff sides of the room with different lightening conditions. Ie the stage and then the tables. I want to capture the moment and think less about operating the camera.

 

Yes, just tried. Without Auto ISO, if I set ISO 1600 that is what the flash would use.

 

Question for you guys - if you have a dark room, say 10 dinner tables. Would you use a high ISO with the flash or would you limit yourself to ISO 400 (underexpose the ambient) and then the flash? Wouldn't the back be underexposed unless you have somewhere to bounce the flash. Often I find the ceilings are brown color.

 

I shoot flash with ISO 800 and 1600 often. However, whenever I use flash the camera is totally on manual. With any auto mode A, P or S and auto ISO it would become a confusing mess.

...and the SB-800 is not appreciably different in output from any older(SB-28) or newer(SB-900, SB-5000) Nikon high end shoe mount flashes.

 

- Correct. Nikon haven't upped the game of their high-end flashes - power wise - for years. Right back to the SB-24.

 

Coincidentally I recently took one of my SB-800s out in the dark, just to see what sort of 'reach' I could get with it. With the kit 18-140 lens on my D7200 at a modest f/4.5 and the ISO set to 800 I could light up objects 30 metres (100ft) away quite easily when the flash 'zoom' was set to 105mm. Remember, this was outdoors at night, with very little to reflect or bounce the flash around.

 

Of course the quality of light was pretty awful, being very hard and frontal.

 

In the past I've bounced a speedlight off a 20 ft high cream-painted ceiling in a barn-sized venue and got perfectly exposed results. AWB took care of the tint from the ceiling, and Auto-aperture flash mode handled the exposure. ISO was set manually to 800 or 1600 - I can't remember which to be honest.

 

I just wouldn't trust i-TTL and auto-ISO in combo to get it right. And if conditions allow, I don't even trust i-TTL over manual power setting or Auto-aperture mode.

- Correct. Nikon haven't upped the game of their high-end flashes - power wise - for years. Right back to the SB-24.

 

To be fair, at a comparable zoom setting the output of the flagship Nikon flash is roughly comparable to the venerable Vivitar 283.

 

I'm always skeptical of the real-world output of a 4(or 5) cell shoe mount flash if it's claimed to be much higher than this.

 

There's a reason why I went to the expense of buying a fresh SLA for my Metz 60 CT-4 and also bought some fresh packs for my 76 MZ-5 not too long ago. I know handle mount isn't the end all and be all, but they can still throw more light(and IMO look better) than most any flash sitting on the shoe.

Don't overestimate AI, if the computers were really that smart, those invasive species, you know, humans, would be exterminated long time ago:)

To get serious, set camera to the settings you want to have in manual mode, F stop, shutter speed, ISO and leave flash in TTL mode. Camera will adjust flash power to get correct exposure, if flash isn't powerful enough raze ISO.

To be fair, at a comparable zoom setting the output of the flagship Nikon flash is roughly comparable to the venerable Vivitar 283

 

Not so. That vastly overrated old Vivitar has about 2/3rds of the flash energy of any of Nikon's top-line speedlights.

 

The Nikons (and Canons) all have a 1400uF capacitor storing around 75 Joules. Whereas the 1970s build-standard Vivitars only have a 1000uF capacitor IIRC, with a subsequent energy storage around 50 Joules.

 

Also, the head of the Vivitar doesn't zoom or swivel, and you need a separate plug-in module to change between auto-thyristor and manual control mode. And having got manual control, the setting is vague and not easily repeatable.

 

So why people rave about those crude old Vivitar flashes is beyond me. They're just one step up from a Hanimex/Cobra branded piece of junk.