Strange thing happening in my images.

[jaalam_aiken]

<p>Someone please help explain this. Shot with a Nikon D810 and Nikkor 24-70 f2.8. Notice the chandeliers at the top of the image. Half on and half off. </p>

<p><img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/18161399-lg.jpg" alt="" width="667" height="1000" /><br>

The next two images were shot just a second apart. Notice the Chandelier is off in one and on in the next. I've shot at the venue 50 times and never seen this before. <br>

<img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/18161401-lg.jpg" alt="" width="667" height="1000" /><br>

<img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/18161402-lg.jpg" alt="" width="667" height="1000" /></p>

<p>Any thoughts?</p>

[Ed_Ingold]

<p>LED lamps are either on or off, but with some persistence. Dimmers work by reducing the on time but with a longer cycle time than dictated by alternating current. You are experiencing a time-aliasing effect between your shutter and the dimmer.</p>

[Matthew Currie]

<p>Were the lights LED or fluorescent? They blink, and I think if your shutter speed is faster than 1/60 second, some or all will be off.</p>

[User_4754088]

<p>I've not shot in a situation exactly like yours, but I might suggest it is the lights themselves. With all these new LED and other types of bulbs, I would not be surprised if the chandeliers in your pictures actually have the bulbs turning on and off at high rates of speed, something that isn't noticed with the human eye, but is picked up by your camera because of shutter speed.</p>

<p>Many of the high school gyms I shoot at these days have these new lights that cycle at high speed between light that is white, green and orange. If you are sitting in the gym, the light looks normal, but when I am shooting at 1/640 of a second, at high speed, a series of ten images of a basketball player making a lay-up, the first image will have a strong green tint, the second pure white tint, the third a strong orange tint, then green, white, orange over and over for the series. But again, if you were sitting in the gym watching the game, you wouldn't notice any change in the light color.</p>

[jaalam_aiken]

<p>I appreciate the explanations. I realized after I posted this that I have not in fact shot here before. The owners built this venue to match their other venue but obviously they are using a different type of lighting. I almost forgot i wasn't in the same place. I imagine this will end up being an issue they didn't foresee. I'm sure I won't be the only photographer to bring this to their attention. Thanks again for the help!<br>

<br />Jay </p>

[eric_arnold]

<p>FWIW, the new D500 and D5 have a flicker adjustment mode.</p>

[Two23]

<p>The only way I can see to cope would be to set shutter to 1/60s or even slightly slower and use fill flash. I would then try to clone the lighting fixture so it looks like all the lights are on. Bummer.</p>

<p>Kent in SD</p>

[ShunCheung]

<p>If you use a slow shutter speed, the flower girl may be ok as long as you can capture a moment when she isn't moving much. For the first dance images, it will definitely be problematic. The dance is one of a few occasions where you may have fast action in wedding photography such that you need a fast shutter speed.</p>

<p>Unless you have one of those new cameras with flicker control, and how perfect that works remains to be seen, I would simply capture more image samples so that you have more choices to pick from. You want to do that anyway. Nobody else needs to see the less-than-ideal images.</p>

[mag_miksch]

<p>or try to avoid that lights inside the frame</p>

[Barry Clemmons Photography]

<p>Eric, it is my understanding that only the D500 has the new flicker control and not the D5. I could be wrong on that but I believe I read that somewhere. If so, it does seem odd that they would leave it off the D5.</p>

[ShunCheung]

<p>This is straight from the Nikon D500 brochure:<br /> http://chsvimg.nikon.com/lineup/microsite/d500/common/pdf/technology-digest.pdf</p>

<p>I suppose Nikon calls it flicker reduction rather than total elimination for a reason. It is like vibration reduction, not vibration elimination.</p><div></div>

[Barry Clemmons Photography]

<p>I wonder why the D5 will support Flicker Reduction for movies but not stills?</p>

[bebu_lamar]

<p>I would use more flash power both bounce off the ceiling and straight forward. I would make the couple brighter and the background as well as the chandelier darker and I don't care if it's on or off. </p>

[Two23]

<blockquote>

<p>or try to avoid that lights inside the frame</p>

<p> </p>

</blockquote>

<p>A partial solution. The problem is that since light moves at the speed of light, the main subject will also be mostly in the dark for that split second. Looks to me like this sort of lighting is going to require you to bring your own, i.e. flash. Bummer.</p>

<p>Kent in SD</p>

[ShunCheung]

<p>To me, the appeal for using available light in indoor wedding and event photography is to retain the indoor, dim atmosphere. Of course it would be easier to use a couple of strong flashes that will also freeze the action, but they can easily overpower everything else and destroy the mood. When there is a beautiful chandelier, I definitely would like to have it, with the light on, in part of some images.</p>

<p>The difficulty is to combine the contribution from a flash as well as some available light such that the final image shows both. Since the available light is usually dim compared to the flash, typically you'll need a slow shutter speed to increase the contribution ratio from available light, but when there is action, you have a problem.</p>

<p>That is exactly why indoor sports photography can be really demanding on equipment: the combination of dim light and high shutter speed is challenging. The high-ISO capability of modern DSLRs maybe the answer.</p>

[bebu_lamar]

<p>If you want to use the lights from the chandelier and you shoot that particular hall often may be study what kind of lights they are. LED definitely can be on continuously but some cheap LED lights running from AC current would light only half a cycle. But I believe in this case the lights are dimmed via a PWM controller that turns the light on and off rapidly. So may be you can have the light on at maximum when you shoot. That's way you have more light to shoot with. Of course it would destroy the mood for the people there but in the photo it would look better. </p>

[Matthew Currie]

<p>I tried shooting a dimmed LED which does not actually go off but pulsates, and found that a short burst got some percentage full on. Obviously that won't work if you're seeking the split second right moment, but it might in some instances.</p>

[Robin Smith]

<p>I found 1/60th or slower allows most LEDS to appear lit. Can be a drag when people are moving of course</p>

[craig_shearman1]

<p>In these particular shots, it's easy enough to crop out the lighting fixture. (Which in the dance floor shot would also get rid of the speedlightin a softbox.) Going forward, fi you want a chandelier in the picture, easiest thing would seem to be to pop several frames and use the ones that give the best combination of the subject's expression and the light being on. Unfortunately, something the venue owners have done to save money (on electric bills and the labor of replacing light bulbs) has suddenly created more work for photographers who have to shoot there.</p>

[ShunCheung]

<blockquote>

<p>easiest thing would seem to be to pop several frames and use the ones that give the best combination of the subject's expression and the light being on</p>

</blockquote>

<p>The way Murphy's law works, when you get the best subject position and expression, the light is of course going to be off. I would take a lot of samples so that you have more choices.</p>

<p>If you can shoot from a tripod so that your camera position is fixed, perhaps you can merge two images together: one with the best subject expression and another one with the light on. But if you want really good results, it might not be merely simple PhotoShop work.</p>

<p>Below is my very rough attempt to merge the two just as an example. However, if you also want to simulate the contribution of the chandelier illuminating the various items in the picture, it is very difficult.</p><div></div>

[rodeo_joe1]

<p>Hmmm, the domestic LED "bulb" I took apart had a rectifier-bridge and smoothing capacitor in it. So, I suspect this only affects cheap Xmas decoration type LED strings.</p>

<p>Part of me wants to investigate the phenomenon to see how widespread those flickering LEDs are. I'm resisting adding it to my list of projects.</p>