Will Robb Photography

For photography, lighting is one of the most important elements in getting a good shot. You have to have enough light so you can see your subject, but sometimes too much light can leave washed out shots with the contrasts are just too extreme, leaving a result that is a disaster for some (but perhaps an artistic success to others). Natural light is the best source of light you can use, but sometimes when mother nature isn’t bathing your subject in golden light (or bathing it in too much) you can always use your flash to help out.

Compact digital cameras have been a big hit, they help almost everyone take good photos by doing most of the adjustments for you, one of the big ones being automatic light readings which determine whether the flash will be deployed. Many of the amateur-semi pro level DSLR cameras have the same function when on automatic settings to help ensure a better shot. These are all good and take the hard work out of things for you. Most of the time they are pretty accurate, listen to what your camera tells you and you’ll probably get better shots 90% of the time.

I use a canon EOS 5D mark II as my main camera (I have a EOS 5D as back up). These higher end cameras don’t have a pop up flash, so I use a canon 580EX speedlite flash. It’s a great flash, the head swivels 180 degrees round and I also get about 90 degrees swivel up and down, so basically I can point it wherever I want (I’ll deal more with this in the future). Also, to give me more flexibility I use an off shoe cable so I can hold the flash away from my camera to create more angles.

One of the benefits of this set up is photographing up close on sunny days. If the subject is bathed in light, there’s no need for the flash, but if the subject has it’s back to the sun, you will just get a dark subject and a bright background. However, when you flash onto the subject you brighten it up a lot and you get a nice clear background as well.

For this photo of the sunflower (below) I had the camera up level with the flower (which was actually blowing quite wildly in the wind) and had the flash with the off shoe cable pointing down onto the flower with some nice results. This photo was actually taken in a residential area with houses and overhead cables all around, I just made sure I composed the shot with nothing in the background that would ruin the image. Importantly as well, when flashing down like this the shadow from the flash was cast down away from the photo to make the flower sharp and also keep the sky shining in the background.

Basically, any in built flashes you have will do the trick, but if you have a DSLR of any kind and you learn to use a better grade flash you will reap a lot of benefits.