Group photo with flash

Precisionpro

Senior Member
How would you position two SB 910's
How would you go about positioning them to take a photograph of about 40 people in a choir in a church?
I have two 9 foot flash stands. I thought about a stand either side of me facing into the choir at 9 foot. Would there be a cross over exposed or would the camera flash see to that?

What is the flash operating range for remote flash with a D7000 and SB910?

Thanks


 

Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
How would you position two SB 910's
How would you go about positioning them to take a photograph of about 40 people in a choir in a church?
I have two 9 foot flash stands. I thought about a stand either side of me facing into the choir at 9 foot. Would there be a cross over exposed or would the camera flash see to that?

What is the flash operating range for remote flash with a D7000 and SB910?

Thanks


No need to cross-post...

https://nikonites.com/d7000/41624-group-photograph-d7000-two-flashes.html#post666342
 

hark

Administrator
Staff member
Super Mod
Contributor
How high is the ceiling? And what color is the ceiling? Aiming bare flash directly at the people will be too harsh. It would be better to either bounce the lights or use some type of modifiers.

I took a photo of my church's choir a couple of years ago. Be sure to expose properly...and by that I mean take a photo without flash to see what ISO will properly expose the background. Keep in mind you will need to use a shutter speed that is at or below the shutter sync speed of your camera's body. And your aperture will need to be stopped down enough to get everyone in sharp focus. And that might be around f/8 or f/11 depending upon the number of rows of people.

Since my church tends to be dark, I kept my shutter speed at 1/60" (that allows in more background light than a higher shutter speed). ISO 1000 and aperture was f/7.1 for 3 rows of people with a focal length of 65mm. It turned out okay, but I should have gone with a slightly higher ISO and used f/8. I used one SB910 on TTL (not at full power...can't remember how much power I used) and bounced it off the ceiling. I also had its diffusion dome attached when I bounced it. It was off camera flash (used a flash bracket).

You will want to expose properly so you don't have to raise your exposure when doing post processing. You will wind up adding noise if you have to raise your exposure when post processing.

EDIT: Choir lofts can be rather dark unless you have lots of light (either lit by windows or artificial light). My choir loft only has light through many small stained glass windows which are behind the people. So that light doesn't help their faces. Keep in mind if you have a lot of artificial light--whether tungsten (light bulbs) or fluorescent--your flash needs to overpower those other lights. Otherwise you run the risk of getting either a brownish tint from the tungsten bulbs or greenish tint from the fluorescent lights. And that colored tint may not be constant all over your image. If some people are positioned closer to an artificial light source that gives off a colored tint, you may need to edit their faces with an adjustment brush when post processing. It's not hard to do. Just trying to cover all the bases so you know ahead of time!
 
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spb_stan

Senior Member
If the flash units are close to the group, the distance between members sees a wider light fall off. So to get even lighting you might want to figure the fall off related to the Inverse Square Law. Further away from the source means less light but less difference in front to back rows or from nearest member to furthest. A flash 10 feet away will be a lot of light drop off to the rear row that is 12-13 feet way. A light source 20 feet away will see a lot less drop between rows. This usually requires strobe with defusion if you get much further than 20 feet. Bounce can work sometimes but there is even less light reaching the subjects because the Inverse Square Law again comes into play by attenuating light equal to the distance to the ceiling plus back to the subjects plus a reduction factor of the absorption of the ceiling.
If there is ambient light to help you be sure to gel your flash units so they match the color temperature of the ambient or you will never get the colors right.
It helps to get the lights up so there is no shadow on the background from the camera's point of view or move the group father from a wall so the fall of is enough to keep the back low in illumination.

If you have access to the venue before the day of the shoot, go experiment so you have decided how to light it before the choir comes. You can use a couple coat racks, one closer to the camera and one representing the furthest row. Try bounce to the rear wall to avoid the raccoon eye look of dark eye sockets which is the result from light source coming from too high an angle. The coat rack or even chairs will give you a reasonable idea of shadows, relative light levels front and back row and color temperature conflicts with ambient and the flash. This will make the real session much smoother and professional since no experimenting is needed when the people are waiting or getting frustrated by delays.

Good luck
 
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