Washington School of Photography handout to teach students how to successfully use their portable flashes on camera and off-camera. Discusses bouncing light, remote triggers, modifiers, and others.

1. Introduction to Portable
Flash
With Adam S. Lowe [Adam@ASLphoto.com]
Washington School Of Photography

2. About Adam
Twitter: @AdamSLowe
Instagram: AdamSLowePhotography
Email: Adam@ASLphoto.com
Web: www.ASLphoto.com
Address: 12276 Wilkins Ave, Studio 106, Rockville, MD 20852
@DCPhotoSchool
www.WashingtonArtworks.com
Weddings | Portraits | Events | Commercial | Education

3. Agenda
• Week 1 – The basics of exposure and flash
• Camera and manual exposure review
• Portable flash hardware and controls
• How flash affects the exposure triangle
• Basics of bounce flash
• Week 2 – Balancing flash
• Mixing flash with available light
• Using flash indoors
• Using flash outdoors
• Handling difficult situations

4. Agenda
•Week 3 – Modifying The Light
•Flash diffusers
•Flash modifiers
•Gels & Gobos
•Week 4 – Off-Camera Flash
•Ways to use flash off-camera
•Off-camera flash techniques
•Off-camera flash modifiers
•One light, two lights, three lights…

5. What You’ll Need
(Don’t buy anything unless you absolutely need it)

6. What You’ll Need
• Camera with manual exposure controls and a hot shoe
• Canon or Nikon DSLR preferred
• Flash with TTL, manual exposure controls, and a swiveling/pivoting head
• Nikon SB-700, SB-910
• Canon 430 EX II, 600 EX-RT
• Yongnuo YN-565, YN600EX-RT
• Remote trigger or sync cord to use your flash off-camera
• CowboyStudio NPT-04 4 Channel Wireless Trigger for External Speedlights with 1 Trigger and 2
Receivers ($27.33 on Amazon)
• Vello Hot Shoe Adapter with PC Socket + Top Shoe - for Nikon or Canon (TTL pass-through) ($29.95 on
B&H)
• PocketWizard Plus III or Flex TT5 Transceivers ($150-$220 each)
• Don’t buy any new toys until after the class. You’ll have plenty of time to play
with gadgets and gizmos and will probably realize that you need less than you
think!

7. Understanding Exposure
Everything is a trade-off

8. What is a “Stop” of light?
• Doubling or halving of light
• Cameras typically work in 1/3 stops. Each “click” of the wheel or knob
is 1/3 stop
• For simplicity, I’ll refer to stops in full stop increments

9. The Three Elements of Exposure
Darker Brighter
ISO – Your sensor’s sensitivity to light
100 200 400 800 1600 3200 6400
Less Noise More Noise
Aperture – How much light makes it through the lens
f/22 f/16 f/11 f/8 f/5.6 f/4 f/2.8
Wider depth of field (more in focus) Shallower depth of field (blurry background)
Shutter Speed – How long the camera lets light reach the sensor
1/1000 1/500 1/250 1/125 1/60 1/30 1/15 1/4
Freezes fast moving subjects Shows motion (blur)

10. Steps to Shoot in Manual Mode1. Set the ISO:
100 Sunny
200 Partly Cloudy
400 Overcast
800 Indoor/Sports
1600 Dark Lighting
3200 Very Dark Lighting
6400 Night
2. Set the Aperture:
f/1.2 – f/3.5 Very Blurry backgrounds (Portraits)
f/3.5 – f/6.3 Slightly blurry backgrounds
f/6.3 – f/32 Sharp backgrounds (Landscapes)
3. Set the Shutter Speed:
•Use a tripod of the shutter speed is
below 1/the focal length of the lens (ex.
85mm lens and 1/80”)
•Slow shutter speeds blur motion
•Fast shutter speeds freeze action
½–1/8 Blur Water
1/60 Portraits
1/250 Freeze slow subjects
1/500 Freeze kids
1/500 – 1/1000 Sports
1/2000 – 1/4000 Very fast subjects
4. Check the exposure:
•Watch the meter in the bottom of the
viewfinder
•Adjust exposure settings to keep meter in
the middle (at 0)
•Use exposure compensation or
aperture/shutter for minor adjustments
•Review the image on the LCD

11. Understanding Your Flash
So many Buttons and knobs!

12. Flash Hardware
• Tilt and swivel head
• Built-in diffuser
• Built-in bounce card
• TTL & Manual Controls
• Zoom Controls

13. TTL / Manual
• TTL Is the “automatic” mode for your flash
• Most people use their flashes in TTL mode. There is nothing wrong with this!
• Manual mode gives you full control over every aspect
• Learning why the flash is doing what it does will let you troubleshoot problems and
situations as they arise

14. Exposure with Flash
• Differences between aperture and shutter speed
• Aperture controls how much light comes in to the camera
• Shutter speed controls how long the camera reads the light
• Flashes fire instantaneously (effectively)
• One shot, two exposures
• Ambient exposure is controlled with your camera
• The flash’s exposure is controlled by the flash
• Adding flash to the equation…
• Shutter speed controls the amount of ambient light in your exposure
• Most cameras can only use flash at a maximum of 1/200 or 1/250 sec
• High speed sync allows the flash to fire at high shutter speeds, but introduces additional
complexities
• Aperture controls the flash’s exposure
• Flash power controls the brightness of the flash (how long the flash fires)
• Flash zoom controls the “spread” of light from the flash

15. Basics of Bounce Flash
• Experiment with flash directly on the subject.
• With and without the diffuser
• Bounce the flash off a nearby wall
• Bounce the flash off a far wall
• Bounce the flash off a colored wall
• Bounce the flash off the ceiling
• Try straight up, slightly behind you, and slightly ahead of you
• Experiment with the bounce card
• What happens when you use the camera in portrait orientation?