needing some advice urgently plz!

<p>hi all, firstly im using a canon 50d and a canon 550ex flash and i used a tamron 17-50 2.8 lense and carried a canon 1.8 lens in my bag. Now i got asked to take random photos at my friends engagment party, it was held in a nightclub so it was quiet darkish with a few disco lights ( not too many ). I thought this would be a good time to try out a few ideas with camera settings as i was under no pressure at all with the shots. the canon 550ex flash only arrived in the post that morning so i didnt have time to play around with it at all, but first thing i done when i got there is set my gear up and put a new umbrella flash diffuser on the flash (neat little item from hong kong ) , and put my camera to manual 1/250 .....f 6.3.....iso 100 and set the flash to 1/4 power and took a nice shot of my partner and took some nice pics, but it was the group pics or couple pics that was my prob trying to get everyone in the pics crisp and sharp , so i put the camera into 'P' MODE just to see, and that was no good as it was setting the apture to 2.8 etc so still not sharp, even though i was under no pressure i was so egar to get this right i started to go all to tit's! Now ive put all of the pics into lightroom and looked most of the photos are ok and i doubt anyone will complain or comment on the DVD slideshow that i promised them for free, but when i look at the few which i got one person sharp and thier partner next to them kinda blurry im annoyed at myself. I hope i explained it ok, i didnt know if it was the flash ( oh yeah i did later on put the flash to ETTL. I HADNT USED THIS BEFORE AS MY LAST FLASH DIDNT HAVE IT. ) The flash seemed to do a good job so i gather it was me and my on carmera settings. ) I got a sunpak 120j on its way as i im getting into off camera flash but im getting asked to do lots of photoshoots for people and events as my photos are very popular on facebook etc. But i need some help on this case for some tips from u experts! thanx a million guys.</p>

<p>Gezzy<br>

all have great new year !!!!</p>

<p>It's hard to tell what's wrong without any seeing any examples.<br /> <br /> I've shot in clubs using f2.8, so I doubt that's the problem.<br>

I would recommend running on a bigger aperture and slower shutter speed. Make sure to use a diffuser and bound upwards.<br>

Here below is a shot I took a couple of months ago and what settings I used.</p><div></div>

<p> I would agree with Fredrik - please post some examples. Based on your settings, I'd be very surprised it you the pictures shot at your original settings weren't quite under exposed. Perhaps what your seeing is signigicant noise after you adjusted the exposure in LR to adjust for your under exposure.<br>

Did you have the same results shooting in E-TTL mode as you did when everything was set manually?<br>

Regards,<br>

Eric</p>

<p>Autofocus in a dark venue could also be an issue. Was your strobe set to pre-flash? Honestly, there's no reason to shoot at ISO 100 in a darkened venue like a club or bar, especially when the photos are going to be provided to the attendees on a CD or DVD and you have control of the display resolution.</p>

<p>I would suggest slowing your shutter by a stop (1/125), increasing your ISO by a stop (200) and setting your flash to second curtain. However, this suggestion is based on <em>not</em> seeing a sample image and should be taken with a grain of salt or in the spirit of experimentation.</p>

<p>I was at a club/bar with friends over the weekend and being the nerdy fella I am, I brought my camera along. I was using a 5D (old school), and a 50/1.4. I had my camera set on Av, ISO 1600, no flash, and manual focus due to my fifty-one-four's recent nuking of it's AF. I was shooting wide-open most of the time. Much of this goes against the rules (never shoot wide-open, ISO 800 should be considered the maximum on a 5D, use a flash for fill, blablabla). My opinion is that they are some of the most inviting, pleasant indoor shots I've ever managed to capture. That isn't to say that they're great but I think they more than pass the litmus of what is acceptable.</p>

<p><img src="http://i140.photobucket.com/albums/r34/F1Addict/Bruderlin/IMG_0332.jpg" alt="" /><br /> <img src="http://i140.photobucket.com/albums/r34/F1Addict/Bruderlin/IMG_0327.jpg" alt="" /><br /> The first shot was at 1/50 and the second at 1/60, both at f/1.4 ISO 1600. The only post-processing was modest sharpening of the RAW data in DPP. These images portray the ambient lighting as perhaps 1 to 1.5 stops brighter than it actually appeared to the eye.</p>

<p>thank u all for giving advice, jeff i didnt try taking a pic without flash using the ambiant light as i was quite dark in there i must say, but your pics i like, and as for 2nd curtain flash & pre flash, id only had the flash that morning & didnt have time to mess about with it so i wasnt sure how to set it up for this, as my other flash was so basic and cheap. ill post 3 of the worse photos for you to acress. thx again</p><div></div>

<p>another</p><div></div>

<p>last one! thx guys.....These were the worse of the bunch, so thx for your comments and help</p><div></div>

<p>for some reason they look brighter on here?</p>

<p>Your basic issue is DOF--particularly in the one with the two little girls. DOF is affected by subject distance, f stop and focal length. f3.2 at that focal length and subject distance, does not provide enough DOF. That was probably the same for the first group picture, and the last one looks to be misplaced focus point. Go to dofmaster.com and read about it and use the online, free calculator. There are also instructions to make one for 'in the field'.</p>

<p>On ones like the last one, you can kind of 'save' the image by using Focus Magic. It won't make the image look like it was in focus to begin with, but when printed at the most popular sizes, it will look sharp. It won't look as good on a monitor, but it will look better.</p>

<p>Jeff, those are fabulous shots. They really shoot the EF 50/1.4 naysayers all to hell, and show off the virtues of full frame. But more importantly, they capture your subjects characters' exceptionally well. And for that, all credit goes to the photographer, and none to the gear.</p>