Flashing

[Dav3yboy]

Flash Guns to be specific.

I've been looking at getting the cheap Jessops 360AFD as I probably won't be using it that much and have a little budget for accessories. My sister is having a photoshoot soon with other models btw :P Shooting in the afternoon and outdoors. So i have offered to let her use my camera and was wondering if I should help out by buying a Flash gun to make her pictures a lot better.

Anywhoo, was just wondering if this flash gun is any good? or should I try and use a Mini soft box/bouncer/cover for the Pop Up Flash.

Thanks in advance.

David.

[davepoth]

Depends on the type of work really, but as a rule I don't like artificial light.

[Dav3yboy]

Well hopefully I will be able to shoot some cars later on, also i tend to find myself shooting in dark areas, friends houses with poor lighting. I agree with natural lighting but when I am shooting i just wish i had that extra little bit of light as I hate boosting up the ISO. Also tend to switch to my 50mm F2.8 in low light and struggle with low lights. Canon 550D.

I just don't the flash to be too powerful. I might have answered my quest in that paragraph, if i am struggling then I think an added flash should help out.

[Simpo Two]

Fill flash is a handy technique - most of the photos on my site use it - but the camera's built-in flash will do very little especially with a diffuser - it's not powerful enough to have any effect on decent daylight unless close. I doubt the Jessops flash will 'talk' to your camera's metering system but you can still use it on manual, adjusting the power until you get the balance you want.

[RobDickinson]

davepoth said:

Depends on the type of work really, but as a rule I don't like artificial light.

If it looks artificial your doing it wrong.

Having a decent flash or two and some modifiers is very handy.

[flat-planedCrank]

RobDickinson said:

If it looks artificial your doing it wrong.

This ^

As Simpo said, fill flash can be incredibly useful - 'balancing' the light even when taking shots on a bright sunny day.

[MikeGTi]

RobDickinson said:

If it looks artificial your doing it wrong.

Definitely true.

David Hobby over at www.strobist.com has plenty of tutorials for using flash guns on his site - I found it very useful when I first started using flash.