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My first play with my new sb800 (xmas pressie from Mum.. got to love your Mum) didn't pan out as well as I would have liked, The fault was all mine though as I will explain.

The gf had some candles burning so thought I would have a play with low light and high iso as I'm still learning the capabilities of the d50.

This pic was the result

55mm, 1/20sec (hand held), f5.6, iso 1600


I was pleasantly surprised with the low level of grain in this pic and what is there adds to the mood for me. Worked nicely, I thought.

Put on the flash to take some portraits, bounced the flash every which way and got some shots that looked pretty good in the camera. Loaded them into the computer, opened the first one in NC and thought "what the?". Then I looked at the exif, iso 1600!!! Bugger!!!!

Anyway, here are some of the better ones for you all to have a laugh over. They were all taken with the kit lens and are straight off the camera, no pp other than crop & downsize.

38mm, 1/60sec, f5.6, iso1600


40mm, 1/60sec, f10, iso 1600


23mm, 1/60sec, f10, iso 1600


Memo to self -- check your settings, then check your settings, and then...check your bloody settings, you idiot.

I'm okay now, the drugs have kicked in.

Cheers, John

ps. The flash is great.

John

Not resetting the ISO is a mistake we all make. I'd play with the white balance a little to cool down the yellow cast in the first one a touch. Of the rest, the last one is the standout for me since you partner is staring straight at the camera and so engages me more as a viewer.

And yes the SB800 is a sweet piece of gear.

I was going to say the last couple of shots where grainy. I make that sort of mistake also, only amateur photographer after all. I find that any greater than 640 gives some bad looking grain.

Congrats on the Xmas present. And enjoy

As peter said it happens to us all, I was playing with high ISO at the twilight mini meet, then Potatis, LittleB and myself went on a rather long night shoot of which nearly all but the last 20 shots where taken @ 800 or 1600, completely my fault... and I should of twigged when my shots were so over exposed compared to dougs on the SAME settings...

I like the second portrait the most, and prefer the candle shot over all of them... very nice lighting

Thanks guys. Just got a bit frustrated with myself for not getting it right when using the flash for the first time. I'm sure that I'll do it again though. Life is like that.

Pp'd my favourite of the set and I like the way it has turned out. Not perfect, but useable.
Shooting raw certainly helps to salvage images that aren't quite there.



Cheers, John

G'day John,

I like your PP treatment in that last shot, just noticing the areas mixed in with the hair, tricky to treat that as well as the surrounding background. Wonder if you could select that via hue/sat layer with the color picker, then adjust sat to darken etc??? Just thinking out loud...

Oh, forgot to say, the SB800 is an amazing piece of teckonological stuff ain't it? You've done well on your first go, I'm still struggling to work mine out

Thanks for your ideas, Andrew. Will be revisiting it after these pesky xmas celebrations are out of the way.

I hope to have some better shots to work on by then as well.

Cheers, John