B&W Flower

GXR A12, f10.0, 1/30, ISO 100, RAW, 50mm

Just some playing around with the external flash and triggering it remotely by the internal one.

Flash Photography with Cristian - Part 1

No picture today, the weather was not great and I was not inspired. Instead you get a free flash workshop. :)

Imagine you are out with friends drinking and want to take some pictures, I know this is not difficult to imagine. Now, you have basically two options, you can use the on-board flash:


...ugh, maybe not.

You could boost the ISO and get a picture with a lot of noise:


This is much better but still not great.

Now you are out of options or are you?

Well, you could try to use a huge external flash and bounce it but seriously, would you want to carry this on a night out? Most likely not.

There is however another way to get great pictures and all it requires are things you would already have if you are out drinking with friends, beers and other colored drinks. If your camera has a pop-up flash (which most proper cameras have) you can use it together with your drinks to create great flash images.




All you have to do is enable the flash and hold a glass in front of the flash but not the lens and take your picture (see the 2nd picture in this post). Hold it as close as possible to avoid shadows but even with shadows it you can create great effects.


Try experimenting with different colored drinks and have fun but drink responsibly or you won't have enough of the drinks left to take more pictures. ;)

Orchid

GXR, f6.3, 1/2500, ISO 200, RAW, 50mm

Today, I decided to finally try and put the GF-1 flash to some use and also make use of the macro capability of the A12 module.

To be honest I have never really seen the point of using a bis sensor for macro photography where a small sensor does a much better job and macros are usually low ISO pictures anyway. Since the macro AF is completely useless on the GXR and never manages to focus on anything I had to use manual focus for this picture. And trust me, manual focus on a black screen is great fun ;). Since improvising is fun, I made use of the flashlight application for the iPhone to get enough light to focus.

Now, the GF-1 flash is huge and I really don't understand what the point of it is since it completely unbalances the camera. Although I am not a huge fan of flash photography, I decided to see if it's at least usable as off camera flash to be remotely triggered by the on-board flash. This works indeed much better and means it's the only way you would use the GF-1.

This is the best picture of my trials and I know two things now. First, I still don't see the point of using a large sensor for macro and second, flash use is nice but not for me.

Flash Series #4

GRD III, f5, 8 sec., ISO 400, RAW

This will be the last of my flash series pictures before I start a new iPhone week.
Taking a macro picture when you can't see anything on the screen is quite challenging but I still like the result. This was also taken handheld since I don't own a tripod and would not take it with me anyway.

Flash Series #3

GRD III, f2.8, 8 sec., ISO 64, RAW

Although th picture does not look like it has been taken in a park, it has indeed be taken in Grenwich Park not far from the main road through the park. I never understood what this stone in there for and find it looks pretty ugly but maybe it has a point to it that I fail to see.
I have added noise and vignetting to the picture before converting it to b&w using the infrared setting.

Flash Series #2

GRD III, f2.8, 7 sec., ISO 64, RAW

Today, I decided to try out the Slow Syncro flash option on the GRD and play with the flash settings a bit. It is very interesting to take flash pictures in almost complete darkness where there is nothing but black on the LCD screen.

Flash Series #1

GRD III, f2.8, 1/32, ISO 400, RAW

The days are getting shorter, it is darker in the morning when we get out and motly grey during the day. While walking to work today, I got an idea for a short series on my blog.

There is not much I dislike more than flash pictures taken with a compact camera so it only makes sense that I base my theme around this. I will try to take pictures where the use of the built-in flash is obvious and to make it more difficult these pictures need to be taken outside in the park. This means one thing probably and this is that my next pictures will probably be pretty awfull so you have been warned. ;)

My experience with flash is very limited and I try to avoid the use of it whenever possible so this will be a challenge for me to hopefully experiment more with it and get some decent results by the end of it.