Natural Flash at Night and Sync Speed: Ask David Bergman

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Production Equipment Used:

Model: Marisa Roper

Styling and Marisa’s dress designed by: Tahirih Toché

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#NaturalFlash #NightFlash #musicphotography

[mverick]

Adorama should hire Marisa as a Spokesperson. Always a bright shining face.

[michaelhull]

I see Marissa, I click.
Such a beautiful soul.

[pictureeyecandy]

Dave, I would also recommend her to also add panning and use slower shutter speed to show motion instead of freezing the action every time mix it up. When you freeze the drag cars they look like they are just parked on the dragstrip. 
Spot on about using flash to freeze the action with flash.

[prosunsport]

David u ability to explain any photography subject is 💯 Vasili

[jpdj]

David & Mary, (for focal plane shutters) the camera's maximum sync speed, yes max 1/250 at top-pro and 1/200 for most other cameras; high-speed sync, yes, your flash needs to work like stroboscopically and each flash pulse is much less powerful than one full power flash. So what are the options? 1) buy or rent a camera with an (in lens) LEAF SHUTTER. Leaf shutters can properly trigger flash at any speed as they are in the center of the lens next to the diaphragm that gives us the aperture and open/close in a similar way as the diaphragm. The disclaimer is the speedlight's maximum speed. (Another disclaimer is the latency of the camera. A leaf shutter is open for framing and needs to close before it can record a shot through another open/close.) If the shutter speed is 1/1000 sec and the flash's maximum duration is 1/880 sec then we already lose a bit of light from the flash. Here the solution to losing light is, using two speedlights: double the power means the flash duration can be halved. So if one flash needed a 1/880 sec pulse for proper exposure, then two would need 1/1760 and with 1/1000 shutter speed we are in the safe zone. 2) for ANY type of SHUTTER, use several speedlights with radio triggers that each light the subject properly at their distance to the part of the subject that they are lighting. One could light an interesting part in the foreground, one in the background, etc. A couple superclamps can do wonders to fix these radio/speedlight combos to anything. 3) with FOCAL PLANE SHUTTERS (these shutters are also called curtain or slit shutters because they have two "curtains" that fly along the sensor/film as if they are two curtains both going in the same direction, where the travel speed of the curtains is constant and the exposure time is determined by the time between them) HyperSync - the concept of PocketWizard FlexTT5 flash radio triggers that uses knowledge of the camera's timings and places the (keep at full power) flash pulse just before "first curtain" sync. The effect is that we use the entire flash pulse time and get a darker edge in the top and bottom of the screen. The top dark edge may be the night sky and no problem, the bottom dark edge may actually solve an overexposed foreground. If your camera is compatible, then this can do wonders! (the 1/880 sec is based on my Nikon SB-910. Using HyperSync may benefit from "cheap" brands that may have a longer longest flash duration (the flash duration at full power, but these emanate less light per millisecond, of course). So a battery powered studio flash that has a 1/200 sec full power duration may be even better.
Note (a): leaf shutters expose every bit of the frame (sensor, film) at the same time. Focal plane shutters expose parts of the frame at different times depending on the shutter speed. Faster than formal sync speed, the sync speed is an indication of the difference in time. This gives another option to freeze motion with any shutter (but will not work at the drag strip) in that, in a dark studio, we can open the camera's shutter and use the speedlight to expose. If we need only a bit of the speedlight or strobe's power then the flash duration will be accordingly faster. For each F-stop we reduce a flash's power, the duration will be roughly cut in half. For my Nikon SB-910, setting manual flash to 1/128 would theoretically mean its 1/880 sec (roughly 0.001) max duration is cut down to 1/112, 640 sec (roughly In F-stops, 1/128 is 7 F-stops less light.
Note (b): Artistic choices. Wanting to completely freeze a fast moving thing gives a shot that looks like the fast thing is not moving. With focal plane shutters, the default flash synchronization moment is when the first curtain has fully opened (i.e. arrives at the other side). At that moment the second curtain is about to start moving. So, the fastest flash sync speed is a speed that has a moment when both curtains are in a position that completely exposes sensor/film. Some cameras can alternatively trigger at the departure of the second curtain. This means that for the time the shutter was open, until the flash, the available light gives an exposure based on that, so if the moving object, relative to exposure time, does not move too fast, we get motion blur and then the second curtain flash pulse freezes the motion at the last moment. Nice. (If the object moves too fast it will not be visible at all.)

[RedrumVideoProductns]

For drag shows and indoor party events in general, I have had been granted the ability to use off camera flashes and color gels. It's the ideal way to do indoor, color heavy events. Works really well to light up dark environments that have a less than friendly lighting scenarios where overexposing the background means going far too high in ISO for more effective editing in post. It's not about the noise grain, it's the dip in color values for such vibrant events. Most of the time, you can talk with the club/bar/venue to let let you set things up before the show. The color gels really help in just making the show more seamless. Rarely shoot those without gels, depending on the act. Some of my best photos are at drag shows, honestly and I have some of the most famous drag queens under my belt with some of their best drag show shots. Kind of cool to have, since I live in a small city. Sadly, those bigger drag events have gone away where I live, but I at least have those as portfolio work if I ever want to jump back in to that world. Otherwise, definitely recommend it for indoor events otherwise, where color gels make up for the lack of lighting in a room and on the crowd. Also, more controlled light where you aren't solely relying on stage lighting. Always messing with the ETTL to balance depending on the scene. It's difficult in rooms where the lighting scenario is always shifting!

[MikeJamesMedia]

Simple solution that works. Thanks, David and Marisa!

[man_]

Gotta say, the untouched TTL didn't look that bad even with the flash pointed directly at the model. The -1 and -2 ones looked the best for me. Maybe it's also dependent on the background, those lights do trick my eyes that the subject would look better really bright as opposed to just putting a touch of brightness. It might be different if the background didn't have much light, or like during the very late afternoon with the sunset in the background. Thanks for the video!

Always happy to see Marisa, great outfit!

[eemlno]

Marisa `s we love you in LA David you are blessed whit that hermosura on your side

[tonyponce]

Welcome to LA! Thank you for the info!

[thepanel]

Ever notice that your FLASH picks up DUST in the night air when you shoot with flash at night outdoors using a FAST SHUTTER SPEED with NO "drag the shutter" effect? Those white spots look like big, out-of-focus sensor dust spots! (You can avoid the problem by using a longer shutter speed or by taking the flash OFF-CAMERA.)

[lincy]

Been looking for ways to do on camera flash for the under lit scenes, thank you for sharing this tip, will definitely give it a try!

[LaGaspa]

Make sure that when you do the flash compensation in TTL, the adjustment is made in the menu of the flash, not the flash adjustment on the camera body.

[antpruitt]

Good stuff as usual. flash shooting can be tricky....

[davidroth]

This was great! The Model is super pretty, too!

[ARGHAMUKHERJEE]

Why doing ev comp? Just turn on flashes manual mode & select the lowest number 1/128, Same thing.

[chipcurry]

Great job! Looks like y’all are having fun too.

[dprovisuals]

Pointing a small light source directly on your subject is not the best way to go except that is what you are looking for, you can diffuse the light or bounce it off a reflector or something. I think that will produce a better result

[dancu]

A lot of thanks for making and sharing your video!!