Better Bounce Card with Thyristor flashes

[alexander_gisoldi]

I will be taking some pictures at a friend's wedding tomorrow using a Bronica

ETRS with a 75mm 2.8 MC with the speed grip with hotshoe. These are just

candids, etc.--I'm not the official photographer--nor do I want to be because

I'm in the wedding. I have two backs and I plan to bring Portra 400 NC, BW

400CN, Portra 800 and Tri-x. I'm just hoping I'll have a chance to even shoot

off one roll of 15 shots being in the wedding, but I'll give it a try.

 

My question is about the Better Bounce Card which I made out of white craft

foam and have rubber-banded to a Vivitar 285HV and a Sunpak 383-- 2 cards were

made--one for each flash. From what I can gather and from experimentation with

my ETRS and a flash off to the right of the camera on the grip I will be using

the Vivitar 285 on red mode at f8 at 1/125 with the better bounce card on the

flash straight up for distance of around 5-12 feet or so. Am I in the ball

park?

 

Same setup with the Sunpak 383 on yellow mode at F8 at 1/125--expecting to

light up around 5-12 feet as well. Another ball park calculation?

 

I know Portra 400NC is forgiving of some over-exposure I'm just wondering if in

this range I will get good exposures of the bride and groom.

I'm unsure of lighting conditions in the reception hall so I'm hoping on auto

to get decent exposures. At a previous wedding I had bounced off of a high

ceiling with 285 and got very good results so that too might be an option--play

it by ear I guess. There are no expectations from the bride and groom.

 

I had thought of trying to balance ambient with flash, but I haven't got a

flash meter and probably won't have time for that anyway--I should just be

enjoying the wedding and leaving the camera at home--but I can't! It's

tricky playing with power levels on these two flashes without a flash meter--

just have to bracket. I was thinking of experimenting using 400 NC at 1/15 or

1/30 f4 and using the flash on 1/4 or 1/16 power and bracketing--just guessing

on ambient. Any ideas or is the question difficult to answer because of not

knowing the lighting conditions?

 

Any input from anyone who has used thyristor flashes with the better bounce

card on auto settings or on power levels would be greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks in advance,

 

Alex

[picturesque]

I haven't used the Better Bounce Card, but have used regular bounce cards and the Demb Diffuser with auto thyristor flashes. I would say you are pushing it for f8 and up to 12 feet. I would use f5.6 if you needed 12 feet. f8 and 1/125 isn't going to get you a lot of ambient light either, in indoor reception halls. Also, my Vivitar 285 tends to underexpose by at least a stop, so I set the ISO lower. Plus, it is always better to overexpose with print film. Your question is difficult to answer not knowing the light conditions, but I would err on the overexposure side when in doubt. Print film can take an enormous amount of overexposure. Your experimentation re manual partial power may or may not work depending on subject distance. I would actually overexpose both flashes by a stop (set the ISO lower), keep them on auto with the bounce card, and use f5.6 and a shutter speed appropriate to the ambient--if outdoors, use a gray card with the camera meter to meter the light. Indoors, underexpose the ambient by at least 2 stops with flash (dragging the shutter).

[alexander_gisoldi]

Thanks Nadine for the advice. I will overexpose by a stop when using the 2 flashes on auto-- I'll set the ISO to 200. Does that mean I also need to figure out the ambient light exposure even when using the better bounce card?

 

Just a question about the dragging the shutter and underexposing the ambient by at least 2 stops. Does that mean that I first meter for the background light--let's say the meter reads 1/30 @ f2.8 for 400 NC. Do I then set the aperture to f5.6 so that my exposure is 2 stops under ambient? I think that's what you mean. I think I've got it now... So any way I do it I should always set my ISO a stop lower and then get an ambient exposure and then underexpose 2 stops when using the better bounce card or any other diffuser? Please let me know if I'm getting it. I guess I'll have to bring another camera with a meter so I can meter for the ambient. I've got an unmetered prism on the Bronica.

 

Thank you so much for your help.

 

Alex

[picturesque]

Hi Alex, sorry if this is too late. The overexposing by a stop is just a margin of error for flash and print film. Underexposed film tends to look grainy. You don't necessarily have to figure out ambient light all the time. However, not knowing what the environments are, especially daylight outside, hard to know what to tell you. Without an ambient meter of some kind it will be hard to balance flash to the ambient.

 

Re dragging the shutter--try to read the planetneil.com article on using on-camera flash. It isn't that one normally changes the f stop, but the shutter speed to underexpose the background. So in your example, instead of changing the f stop, you leave the f stop at f2.8 and change the shutter speed to 1/8th. The flash freezes subject motion due to its short duration yet you still get some background detail. That's why you can use such long shutter speeds and the subject is not motion blurred (also handholding rule is negated). If you know what your environment is all indoors and the whole thing takes place during the evening, you don't necessarily have to use a meter and can just go by a broad set of guidelines, but if you are going to use any kind of ambient light as the exposure, it will definitely help, unless you go by a very broad set of ambient guidelines like the kind that used to be printed inside Kodak film boxes.