Lighting 20+ people indoors

[picturesque]

<p>RT--I don't think the bridesmaid shot was from 15 feet away. More like 10-12 feet, where the DOF is 3.5-5 feet. The other shots are fine for various reasons (given accurate focus)--more subject distance, only 2 rows, or one row etc. I'm betting the back row or 2 of the bridesmaids shot is OOF, or at least falling out of DOF range. You can't tell about focus from small, online images. Also, even though you can use a wider aperture, can you do so repeatedly, under pressure? Spreading your available DOF 'just so' is not all that easy to do time after time. This is why most people use a margin of error on groups. Plus sticking with one EV means you don't waste time trying to change the lights, etc. from group to group.</p>

<p>I disagree about background blurring for altar formals, Joey. I don't think, in this situation, the background blurring is first priority. I think accurate focus and lighting on the people are first priority (not saying you didn't achieve this here for the most part). In fact, I would bet that if you were to ask your clients about background blurring, they would not care or notice that they 'stand out' from the background. In fact, I would also bet that people like the background sharper. It is their church, and the altar is actually something they like seeing in focus. It is actually an important part of the images, or else why have the formals there? Otherwise, it could be anywhere. Background blurring has it's place, but in this situation, that place is fairly low on the list, IMHO.</p>

<p>I was also waiting for you to address the problem you mentioned above?</p>

<p>Back to the general topic, another thing to mention is that when you have a light or white space to work with, just sheer reflectance from your flashes (plus the ability to bounce) can make a big difference in the final result. If your space is dark or non reflective, you aren't going to be able to rely so much on ambient or flash reflectance to maximize your flash power without running into other issues. Also, if you have to balance your subject EV to bright windows in the background, or brightly lit stained glass, or have sunlight hitting your subjects or have spotlights on your subject that you can't turn off, as Marc says, you need to be able to handle it. Unfortunately, it isn't as simple as just moving everyone. People like having their formals centered on the altar and expect you to be able to do them there, no matter what the light is like.</p>

[picturesque]

<p>Also forgot. I bring a short step ladder with me sometimes and I don't have assistants. I can bungee it to my rolling case. I also have a shoulder strap on it. Recently, I also purchased a folding stepstool. It only gives me a foot or so, but I leave it in the car and it folds and has a grip hole so it is easy to carry, always handy, and can also be tied to bungeed onto gear. I am 5' 1" tall, so I need it.</p>

[rt_jones]

<p><em><strong>The "nice ambient" is misleading because it is being augmented by an on-camera 580EX bounced against a high (but white) ceiling.</strong></em><br>

Well, at what point were you going to divulge this? Your description of all this goes form using "Sunpak 383s" (The plural of a single sunpak) and now, a 580ex and just a single sunpak?</p>

<p>And Nadine, I agree with mostly everything you said. The only difference being Joey who has done this a lot so I can only assume he knew what he was getting into. Myself personally, I wouldn't have shot at f/2.2. Even a group of 3 or 4 with 3-1/2 feet DOF is beyond my comfort level. I might do two shots with different settings for each one but I'd always have a trusty f/5.6 to fall back on.</p>

[William Michael]

<p ><strong ><em >Not really William. f/2.2, 35mm from 15 feet away gives you 8 feet DOF. Plenty of room. The proof is in Joey's photos. (RT Jones)</em></strong></p>

<p ><strong ><em > </em></strong></p>

<p >If the image of the Bride, Maids and Little Girl is a Full Frame Crop from a 5D and the Bride is about 5’8” (My “Average Sized Woman”) then this is what I refer to as a <em >Full Length Shot - Horizontal Format</em>.</p>

<p > </p>

<p >There is a bit of air above the Bride and a bit of feet room below her – that give around 7ft to 8ft FoV(v) (Field of View on the Vertical).</p>

<p > </p>

<p >Therefore this shot was pulled at about 12ft – possibly 11ft</p>

<p > </p>

<p >Assuming we respect 0.025mm CoC (Circle of Confusion) for a 5D camera, that will afford a DoF of 4ft.</p>

<p > </p>

<p >Now: the Women are stacked tight and are 5 deep, and in tight stacking I allow 12 inches depth, for each person – we have already exceeded the 4ft DoF <strong ><em >and I have not yet begun to argue the relevance that DoF is a sliding scale – at the edges of DoF the image is soft.</em></strong></p>

<p > </p>

<p > </p>

<p >*** </p>

<p > </p>

<p > </p>

<p >With great respect to The Image - I do not agree that anyone can say that the web image proves or disproves anything, the quality of a web image is inferior for this purpose – however IMO when viewed on a good monitor, the woman at the rear looks softer than the others.</p>

<p > </p>

<p >***</p>

<p > </p>

<p >Please note that my calculation have taken the BEST case scenario to give the GREATEST DoF and IMO it is likely that the shot was pulled at about 11 or 10 ft <strong ><em >and there is also the possibility that the image was cropped slightly hence the DoF will be even smaller.</em></strong></p>

<p > </p>

<p >***</p>

<p > </p>

<p >I am quite adamant about limits with DoF as and how I apply them to “The Shot” </p>

<p > </p>

<p >This is perhaps my training in cine and also the fact that I cut my teeth within a W&P studio where Formal Shots (like the one being discussed) were bread and butter money – because the Customer would buy a 10x8, 16 x20 etc of these images and when we go to those enlargements DoF is critical.</p>

<p > </p>

<p >I re affirm that for full length Shot horizontal Format using a 135 format camera (a 5D, for example) my Safe DoF Limit is F/5.6.</p>

<p > </p>

<p >WW </p>

<p > </p>

<p >PS Just as a technical note RT, I referenced 0.025mm CoC - using that (IMO an acceptable standard) at F2.2 for a 5D at 15ft with a35mm lens loaded the DoF is 6'4" - not 8ft - your calculations must be using a different CoC - something like 0.031mm whcih I consider not acceptable.</p>

[William Michael]

<p ><strong ><em >ERROR in may last posting:</em></strong></p>

<p > </p>

<p >“Please note that my calculation have taken the BEST case scenario to give the GREATEST DoF and IMO it is likely that the shot was pulled at about 11 or 10 ft <em><strong>and there is also the possibility that the image was cropped slightly hence the DoF will be even smaller.”</strong></em></p>

<p > </p>

<p > </p>

<p >Correction – this paragraph was meant to give <strong ><em >a counter argument</em></strong> and thus read:</p>

<p > </p>

<p >“Please note that my calculation have taken the BEST case scenario to give the GREATEST DoF and IMO it is likely that the shot was pulled at about 11 or 10 ft . . . <strong ><em >However <em>there is also the possibility that the image was cropped slightly, hence the DoF will be slightly LARGER.”</em></em></strong></p>

<p ><em><strong> </strong></em></p>

<p ><em><strong>WW</strong></em></p>

[ejder]

<p>...The issue I was made aware of was that there is banding noise in the shadows, and I have recently discovered it is from the flash battery packs mounted to my cameras. I will be having to remove a lot of such noise from that wedding's photos because I used them the entire day.</p>

[William Michael]

<p><em>"There's a problem I just noticed, and I will be needing to address it." & "banding noise" . . . </em><br>

Yes: previously noticed.<br>

<br>

+++<br>

<br>

<em>"it is from the flash battery packs <strong>mounted to my cameras."</strong></em><br>

<em>Very generous to share this information <strong>- others should take note.</strong></em><br>

<br>

+++ <br>

<br>

Have you bought your 24L yet? What do you think of it?<br>

<br>

WW<br>

</p>

<p > </p>

 

[picturesque]

<p>Ahh...that old radio interference. I completely understand. I'm about ready to sell my 580EX II and replace it with the original 580EX (thought this might make more sense than throwing over a bridge).</p>

[ejder]

<p>I didn't know about the radio interference until I ran into it myself, and just yesterday I found an archived post on your forums talking about the same issue with Canon battery packs. Ergo, I just have to keep them on my belt or similar position away from the cameras.</p>

<p>The 24L is okay for me. Nice that I have the focal length again, but I am not getting such unique use out of it that I wouldn't have gotten from the 24-70 (when I owned it). Does the bouquet/garter tosses like I want, but now I am probably going to consider a tokina 11-16mm for some of the same purposes of ultrawide with f/2.8.</p>

<p>85L went back to Canon Irvine today for a recurring focus issue. I'm going to miss it tomorrow, the 23rd and the 26th. It's my second most used lens next to the 35L.</p>

[ejder]

<p>I think I would like greater depth of field and potential for a wider angle for my bouquet toss shots. And I think I'd like to try tethering two cameras to a single remote trigger for things like this so they could both pick up the flash simultaneously. Might be fun - not necessarily much point to it, but fun.</p>

<p>These were with the 24L, same wedding on 5/15/10, f/2.2, ISO1000.</p>

<p><img src="http://www.joeyallenphoto.com/Weddings/May15_10/IMG_8211_2.jpg" alt="" /><img src="http://www.joeyallenphoto.com/Weddings/May15_10/IMG_8213_2.jpg" alt="" width="700" height="467" /><img src="http://www.joeyallenphoto.com/Weddings/May15_10/IMG_8215_2.jpg" alt="" /></p>

[ejder]

<p>And about the above posts regarding Sunpaks: Sunpak 383s is a single item - Sunpak 383S for Super. And, the 580EX was flashing in all images shown, so it would be adding to the ambient and not in any way responsible for the greater brightness in one image over another. Did it make a difference? Not actually sure, but maybe it brightened the ambient a little.</p>