weasel_bar

I overheard a conversation recently between 2 docs at the hospital

where I'm a student. One was telling the other how, with the advent

of digital, the focus of photography has changed completely.

Composition is no longer important, because you can fix it with

photoshop. Learning to use photoshop is much more important than pre-

exposure techniques. <br>

2 days later, my friend saw a waterfall photo I had scanned from a

velvia slide, taken with my canon ae-1. He didnt like the bluish

cast from the evening light and the film's tone (which I intended),

so he told me I should have adjusted the "white balance on my camera"

(which was made in 1979). <br>

Do people view photography as largely graphic design now? It

depresses me that many people, even ones who view themselves as

photographers, don't care about lighting, focus, depth of field,

shutter speed, because they're going to fix all of these post-

exposure. I'm not really interested in snapping a frame and then

spending 6 hours screwing around with blurring filters and rgb

correction. I'd rather sit by the waterfall for hours and figure out

what weather, time of day, focal length, and shutter speed I want to

use.

Thanks all for your very informative responses. Mark, special thanks for going out of your way to try different setups. I'd like to use the flash rather than buy a new on--it was my dad's, so has sentimental value. It's also damn powerful. I flashed myself in the eyes at arms length when I was a kid, in spite of (and maybe because of) advice to the contrary. I was seeing floating red squares for several minutes.

I think I'm going to go with the tape option, and block the 2 rear contacts on the hotshoe. I looked up the trigger voltage on google, and found values ranging from 8-15 volts, so unless I decide to stick the flash into my chest and fire, I think I'm ok.

ARTIFICIAL-LOOKING CATCHLIGHTS, HERE I COME!!!

Generally sync speed is maximum. But for some reason the A series seems to be screwy. Don't have the body with me right now, so can't check, but I seem to remember trying to set the shutter to 1sec to test, and it was MUCH faster than 1sec (so I assume 1/60). Unendurable frustration, trying to figure this out.

After reading the manual for the ae-1 and manuals for a couple of

speedlites, it seems that dedicated flashes FORCE the shutter speed

to be 1/60. Even if you select a SLOWER speed, it still will be 1/60.

However, I did see a table in the ae1 manual where it seemed to

indicate that electronic flash allows sync speeds of slower than 1/60.

1)Is this really true? Can't one choose to sync slower than 1/60? I

want to use the flash just as fill, but in low light. If I have to

use 1/60, then I am forced to open up the lens wider than I want to

get the proper ambient/flash light ratio. (I have poor vision and

cant focus well enough if dof is a mere 3 microns on my 135mm)

 

2)Someone told me that if i cover up the back 2 pins, the flash will

be prevented from communicating a sync speed to the body. THe

central pin will tell it when to fire, end of story. I'm afraid to

mess around with this, though, bec. my flash is a Vivitar 3700

thyristor, and I think it uses high voltages.

 

Any help is appreciated. Thanks.

Sadashiv