piggybacking off of someone else's flash?

[pianoplayer88key]

mostly the lighting at the brightest would be indoor with moderate incandescent lighting (for example, my S1 meters in a few rooms in my house at around 1/30" at ISO 400 and F/2.8 for a 0 compensation exposure in aperture priority). Darker situations would be outdoors at night.

The main thing is I don't want my flash to fire, and I want to try for a good exposure without any motion blur or camera shake.

When it's really dark, it probably won't matter so much if I open my aperture up all the way (except that depending on subject location / distance / focal length I do want to be able to get enough depth of field so I have some room for error on focus), although my ISO definitely will not be set above 100.

For ligher pics (indoors with the lights on) am I better off stopping down the aperture to, say, F/8.0, reducing ISO to 50? What should my shutter speed be so that if a flash doesn't fire my pic comes out almost black, but so that if it DOES fire I have a good chance of getting a pic?

Much of the time I'd probably be zoomed in close to 380mm so I wouldn't have to be quite so close to my subject.

Indoors with the lights on (and someone else's flash) I'd probably use rapid fire mode and hope my shutter's open while someone else's flash fires.

When it's really dark, I suppose I could use a longer shutter speed, right? (like maybe 3 or 4 seconds or so)

Anyone have any other suggestions?

[bradg]

pianoplayer88key wrote:

Indoors with the lights on (and someone else's flash) I'd probably use rapid fire mode and hope my shutter's open while someone else's flash fires.

lol

Your kidding right?

Brad

[chihta]

Believe it or not, I piggy backed off someone's flash once. It was not on purpose, but the result was cool. I adjusted my camera for WB and all, but when this guy flashed the object, I got a blue tint. kinda cool.

[zacker]

Hmmmm. Im going to a wedding soon with my pro1 and 420 ex flash... what are the chances that... my flash will fire with the photographers flash (if he's also using a canon)? and if my flash will set his off? also, what happens if we flash at the same time or either just before or just after? i dont want to ruin any of his shots as he will be getting paid for shooting this wedding and Ill just be practicing.. (dont wanna step on any toes)

-zacker-

[eric s]

The chance of your flash firing when his does is very small. A duration of a camera flash is VERY SHORT. But there is a chance that your flash will fire while his shutter is still open (or yours is open when his fires.) That will clearly mess up his photo.

This is why most photographers at weddings explicitly say that you can take all the pictures you want, just not when he is shooting. You can even use his chosen "location and poses" (at least, the confident ones don't care. They know that the magic of their shot is more than the background and the way the people are standing.)

I'm not sure what pianoplayer88key is asking. Could you explain more? To be clear, you're hoping to have your camera set so that if someone else fires a flash the light from their flash will give you a good exposure. I'm truly not sure how you'd do that. Most flashes use a pre-flash to pick the proper metering, and you're camera wouldn't be doing that. So I fear that it would be more luck than anything else.

Eric

[zacker]

YEAH ERIC, iM THINKING I CAN TAKE SHOTS AFTER HE TAKES ONE... BUT LIKE I SAID, HE'S BEING PAID... IM NOT SO I DONT WANT TO SCREW HIM UP AT ALL. MAYBE ILL JUST KEEP MYSELF ON THE OPPISITE SIDE OF THE ROOM FROM HIM, I DONT WANNA BE TOO CLOSE TO HIM WHILE SHOOTING AND POSSIBLY MESS HIM UP.

JUST TRYING TO BE CURTIOUS...

-ZACKER-

[pianoplayer88key]

I have on a couple occasions set my camera to a fairly long shutter speed, and to prevent too much ambient light from getting in, left my ISO low and stopped down the aperture some. Then when the photographer at the wedding would be saying he's about ready to take the shot, I'd time the shot so that I press my shutter right before he presses his. Of course my flash is off, too.
Generally, though, if other people (not professional photographers) are also taking pics at about the same time and it's outside at night, I'll often turn the flash on. Indoors with light, though, I can often get by without it.

[TDM_Canon_User]

Zack,

Not to worry. Your flash should never upset a Pro's flash system. Pro's use radio instead of optical. If you're really worried, ask. Worst concern I'd have is ten-thousand flashes during the ceremony may upset the bride & her family. So use flash as a last resort, just to be courteous (unless the bride & groom have requested you take backup photos).

In general, the odds of your shutter being open when he shoots, or vice-a-versa, is too small to think about:

1/200 shutter, 1/500 flash, means for every image taken 0.005 seconds is "bright". If you take 60 images per minute (clicking once a second), the odds are 200:1 you'll hit. If you are a normal picture taker, you might take one shot per minute, so your odds of collision are more like 18,000:1. Pretty small.

Tim