I set up the flash again. Given that I have no light meter, I really have no clue how to figure out exposure. Granted, I have no clue how to use a light meter, either, but it seems there would be a logical set of steps to follow in learning. Currently, I am using what is known as the “chimping” method of exposure determination: take a photo, review the photo on the LCD to determine quality and go “ooh, ooh” if it’s any good. I don’t find this a good method at all. My flash photos are underexposed by a little to a lot. I tend to err on the side of underexposure anyhow, so this is really excessive. Nonetheless, I do happen to like this one photo of Heather holding Mesa. I admit it was a total accident, and not a terribly good accident at that, but I like it.

This next photo utilizes both flash and natural light. You can tell how much harsher the flash is by the quality of the shadow on Heather’s chest and under her legs. The window light has a nice feathered edge; the flash is straight. The original photo was terribly underexposed. I could have used a longer exposure and a lower percentage of flash to make it that the window lighting was dominant, tho this wouldn’t have eliminated the harsh edge on the flash’s light. I was goofing off with shooting through the umbrella vs. bouncing the light. I think my conclusion was that shooting through the umbrella seemed to produce a harsher light, but of course I didn’t take any notes so I failed to learn anything.

Then I went to check out the window in the back hallway. I like the light from this window, tho there is very little room to place a human in a photo in this location. So I used a very little human. The photo is underexposed again, but, again, I like it.