Should I use flash with my photography?

Question

I have a Nikon D70, and it seems that whenever I use a flash, the picture looks weird and unprofessional. But at times, if I don't use it, the picture is slightly blurry when zoomed in. How can I fix this?

Answer 1

Read the owner's manual. Turn up the ISO, use a tripod or a good lens with image stabilization, and make sure you use the widest aperture possible.

Edit: I forgot to mention that you should make sure the AF focus lamp is turned on. It's the thing that emits red rays.

As a reply to the person below me, a faster shutter speed would work, but the image would probably be unexposed.

I disagree with just about everything that Michael M said. If you care about professional looking pictures then using flash all the time like he suggested would make all of your pictures look unprofessional. A 1/60 second shutter speed may not be enough to prevent blurriness and might result in underexposure. Use a spot meter to ensure proper exposure in bright daylight. And you do not need to put tissue over the flash to soften the light. Just turn down the flash strength.

Answer 2

You should always use the flash, including outdoors.
Ouside is helps fill in the shadows left by the sun.
Inside, it lights up your subject. If your pics are blurry, then the shuuter speed isn't fast enough for your non-flash pics. You can set it to (S) for shuuter priority and set it at least at 1/60or higher to get rid of the blur.

Your camera also has an auto/pre focus. When you push the shutter button lsightly you can feel it give a little. The noise you hear is the camera focusing on your subject. Give it a second before you push the shutter release button all the way down.

If the flash is making your pics look amareur. You can put a thin tissue over it to soften the light.

Answer 3

If you are experiencing blur from nonflash pictures, then the camera is choosing too slow a shutter speed. You can either change the dial to the action setting (running figure) or move your ISO to a higher number such as 800 or more.

Personally, I shoot most of my pictures at ISO 800-1600 and process the digital noise out afterwards.

Also, check how you are holding your camera. Most amateurs don't support the lens correctly, and hold the camera like a book or like a point & shoot. Hold the camera body with your right hand and place your left hand beneath the lens. Stand with your left foot in front of you and your right foot behind, turned at an angle (think ballet). This stabilized you and minimizes the vertical swaying of the camera. Also press down smoothly on the shutter, not smashing it and adding vibration.

If you want to shoot flash and have it look better, invest in an SB 600 dedicated flash. Only Nikon SB flashes (SB400, SB600, or SB800) are dedicated to their iTTL flash system.

The SB600 will allow you to tilt the flash head vertically or horizontally (for times when you turn the camera sideways) which bounces the light off the ceiling for a more appealing light. I also have several different flash diffusers that I place over my SB600 to cut the harshness from the lighting.

Please email me if you have any other questions.

Hope this is helpful.

Answer 4

Correct exposure is dependent on ISO, available light, aperture (f-stop) and shutter speed. In bright sunlight this is seldom a problem unless you set a real high ISO and a wide aperture (f4 or f5.6 perhaps) and the camera doesn't have enough shutter speed to give proper exposure. (An old rule of thumb, the Rule of 16, says "On a bright sunny day set the f-stop to f16 and the shutter speed to the reciprocal of the ISO." So if the ISO is set at 200 you'd use a shutter speed of 1/250 and get correct exposure.)

As light decreases, our options are a higher ISO or a bigger f-stop, such as f2 or f2.8 to keep the shutter speed high enough to hand-hold the camera. (Another old rule of thumb says "The shutter speed should always be the reciprocal of the lens length to safely hand-hold the camera." So if we're using a 200mm lens we should keep the shutter speed at 1/250 second. This has less applicability with Image Stabilization but its still useful if IS isn't built into the camera body or lens.) If we get to f2 and the shutter speed is, say, 1/30 then we have to increase the ISO. Example: f2, ISO 200, shutter speed 1/30. To get our shutter speed to 1/125 our ISO will need to be 800 at f2; Change to f2.8 and our ISO has to be 1200 to keep outr shutter speed at 1/125.

Your flash problem is likely caused by using the camera's built-in flash. Direct flash from the built-in unit is very harsh. George Y was right about getting the right off-camera flash for your camera. Using bounce flash (tilt the flash head up to bounce the light off the ceiling) will definitely improve your flash photography.

If you're interested in low light/night photography, go to fotosharp.com and buy their "Day & Night Exposure Guide". It will give you settings for almost any scene you can think of. The ones for evening/night photography will usually require a tripod.

Answer 5

the flash that is built into your camera has two problems.
1. it's too weak, and
2. it's too close to the lens.


Get a real flash gun (that sits on top of the camera), and then buy a diffuser, so that it doesn't direct the light exactly at your subject, but diffuses it around the room a bit.

that should help a lot! (and is what nearly all pro-photographers do when they are shooting candid portraits at walk-around evening events)