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FEL and E-TTL

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You cannot "see" the preflash because it is so fast--for those that blink, it's a subconscious reaction--you can't consciously pick up both flashes with your eyes.
Jim Forbes said:
Last evening I shot about 80 indoor soccer images using the
external flash. I shot with both eyes open so I can follow the
action - takes a little practice but works - and would surely have
noticed two flash bursts for each shot - I did not.
Click to expand...
--

http://www.pbase.com/jthomaslambert
 
Ronzo said:
I think pressing shutter halfway then pressing * and holding is a
bit strange but that is what the book says to do.
Click to expand...
You don't need to do this. The manual is wrong here. Chuck Westfall has commented on this. When you let go the FEL (or AEL without flash) holds for 16 seconds.

Paul
 
I've never had a single closed eye yet from ETTL preflash and that included shooting tables and tables of people at a reception. Sometimes it is just a coincidence that someone blinks at that moment. In your sisters case where they have demonstrated the sensitivity, I would take photonotes' anectdote and carry it further to it's logical end. With a 2nd curtain enabled flash - drag the shutter just a bit longer (Tv or M mode) so the persons eyes are open again at the 2nd curtain fire. Shouldn't blow out the bg as we're still talking fractions. ~ m²
Frank Mattia said:
Doug Kerr said:
pbleic said:
I am not an E-TTL fan, but another thread made me think about this.
FEL is the preferred method for getting good flash exposures by
pros. I find it is confusing for some subjects. However, I
BELIEVE that FEL will eliminate the other annoying feature of E-TTL
  • the preflash IMMEDIATELY before the flash itself. The one that
causes blinks.
Click to expand...
Certainly the use of FEL confers many benefits. For one, it puts
into play an the "partial" flash metering pattern which, with a
prudent choice of aiming point, made easy in the FEL situation,
appears to be attractive for many scenes.

I am a little mysitifed by your reference to the metering preflash
and its causing the subject to blink. The preflash occurs such a
short period of time before the main flash that I cannot ordinarily
distinguish the two. It is hard to believe that the subject would
react to the preflash rapidly enough to have his eyes closed by the
time of the main flash.

But do you in fact find a distinct difference in this behavior with
the preflash in effect and not? (I assume so from your premise.)

It would be interesting to do some comparison tests that did not
include the additional distraction of the FELmetering burst. One
could take some shots with E-TTL in effect, and then take shots
with the flash in manual (in which case there is no metering
preflash), having set a workable flash output level by
trial-and-error, if necessary.

Best regards,

Doug
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
--
Enjoy life - spend your clothing budget on lenses!
http://rhodeymark.instantlogic.com/PhotoGallery.ilx

 
Of course, if there are other folks in the pic with her, they might decide that's the perfect time to blink so she's the ONLY one with her eyes open. Conundrum anyone? Back to FEL in that case. BTW - I haven't FELd since getting the Stofen and shooting in Av locked to 200. Aperture is my ETTL FEC. ~ m²
Mark Marshall said:
With a 2nd curtain enabled flash -
drag the shutter just a bit longer (Tv or M mode) so the persons
eyes are open again at the 2nd curtain fire. Shouldn't blow out the
bg as we're still talking fractions. ~ m²
Click to expand...
--
Enjoy life - spend your clothing budget on lenses!
http://rhodeymark.instantlogic.com/PhotoGallery.ilx

 
pbleic said:
I am not an E-TTL fan, but another thread made me think about this.
FEL is the preferred method for getting good flash exposures by
pros. I find it is confusing for some subjects. However, I
BELIEVE that FEL will eliminate the other annoying feature of E-TTL
  • the preflash IMMEDIATELY before the flash itself. The one that
causes blinks.

I haven't tested this and am not near my camera ;-(
Is this correct? If so, I would think FEL is definitely the way to
go in flash E-TTL photos. Just warn your subjects, when you can,
that the first flash isn't the real picture.

--
Paul
Click to expand...
Paul,

I agree here and also prefer to use FEL than to risk capturing even a subtle look of surprise on the subject's face. Although I haven't tried it, an additional benefit to FEL would be to keep the button held so as to retain lockl across multiple exposures of the same or substantially similar scene, requiring only one pre-flash for several similar shots (avoiding annoying the subject excessively and saving on battery life). A final benefit for folks who continue to prefer single-point AF is that it gets around the problem of ambient light being metered at shutter half-press (when the subject is centered beneath the central AF point) and the flash being metered with the pre-flash after recomposition and just before the exposure is taken. The result is misidentification of the subject to E-TTL algorithm. I know you'd argue that one shouldn't use this method to begin with but should allow the E-TTL algorithm to have substantial data to match against its database by using all 7 AF points. I won't argue there - I'm just mentionin that for those set on using central AF point, FEL is a help.

David
 
JT,
JThomasLambert said:
You cannot "see" the preflash because it is so fast-
Click to expand...
By "fast" do you mean "short" or do you mean "so quickly followed by the main flash"?

If the former, that's certainly not so. The preflash can be readily seen if you let the main flash follow after a little greater interval than normal. You can see this with a flash unit that allows second-curtain sync. With a shutter time of 1/25, once can readily see that there are two separate flashes.

Best regards,

Doug

-for those that
JThomasLambert said:
blink, it's a subconscious reaction--you can't consciously pick up
both flashes with your eyes.
Jim Forbes said:
Last evening I shot about 80 indoor soccer images using the
external flash. I shot with both eyes open so I can follow the
action - takes a little practice but works - and would surely have
noticed two flash bursts for each shot - I did not.
Click to expand...
--

http://www.pbase.com/jthomaslambert
Click to expand...
 
That is a strange way of doing the FEL.

You can do the FEL before focusing. The FEL holds for 16 seconds, if I remember correctly. You can FEL as many times as you like to override the last FEL.

Not complicated. Press * to FEL the area you like (partial metering at center), focus lock and recompose. Exactly like you would do a partial metering without the flash.
Ronzo said:
Just think how funny that would look at a wedding to top it off get
a game boy to exercise your fingers.
I think Canon has to fix this in firmware if center / partial could
be enabled you would hardly need FE lock.

But 3 550 EXs and 3 CP_E2 power packs would be hard to beet with a 10D
pbleic said:
I am not an E-TTL fan, but another thread made me think about this.
FEL is the preferred method for getting good flash exposures by
pros. I find it is confusing for some subjects. However, I
BELIEVE that FEL will eliminate the other annoying feature of E-TTL
  • the preflash IMMEDIATELY before the flash itself. The one that
causes blinks.

I haven't tested this and am not near my camera ;-(
Is this correct? If so, I would think FEL is definitely the way to
go in flash E-TTL photos. Just warn your subjects, when you can,
that the first flash isn't the real picture.

--
Paul

------------------------------------------------
Pbase supporter
Photographs at: http://www.pbase.com/pbleic
--------------------------------------------------
Copyright 2003, 2004 All rights reserved.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
My mother-in-law is like that. Every single flash shot with the DRebel caught her eye closed. I guess it is a reflex for some people.
Frank Mattia said:
Doug Kerr said:
pbleic said:
I am not an E-TTL fan, but another thread made me think about this.
FEL is the preferred method for getting good flash exposures by
pros. I find it is confusing for some subjects. However, I
BELIEVE that FEL will eliminate the other annoying feature of E-TTL
  • the preflash IMMEDIATELY before the flash itself. The one that
causes blinks.
Click to expand...
Certainly the use of FEL confers many benefits. For one, it puts
into play an the "partial" flash metering pattern which, with a
prudent choice of aiming point, made easy in the FEL situation,
appears to be attractive for many scenes.

I am a little mysitifed by your reference to the metering preflash
and its causing the subject to blink. The preflash occurs such a
short period of time before the main flash that I cannot ordinarily
distinguish the two. It is hard to believe that the subject would
react to the preflash rapidly enough to have his eyes closed by the
time of the main flash.

But do you in fact find a distinct difference in this behavior with
the preflash in effect and not? (I assume so from your premise.)

It would be interesting to do some comparison tests that did not
include the additional distraction of the FELmetering burst. One
could take some shots with E-TTL in effect, and then take shots
with the flash in manual (in which case there is no metering
preflash), having set a workable flash output level by
trial-and-error, if necessary.

Best regards,

Doug
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Homl said:
My mother-in-law is like that. Every single flash shot with the
DRebel caught her eye closed. I guess it is a reflex for some
people.
Click to expand...
The pre-flash occurs 70-80 ms before the BIG ONE... It's within reflexes range. So give her drug or alcohol... she will have slower reflexes... and you'll get pics of your mother in law WASTED.. :)

--
Fabrice won over E-TTL in round #12616
Solution: He bought a Metz 54 MZ3
 
Mark,

If you're controlling the flash through aperture, I'm wondering if bouncing the flash is losing enough light to cause the flash to shoot in Full Power regardless of the ETTL reading.

This would explain why you can control via Aperture. So effectively, you are in Manual Flash mode. What do you think?
Mark Marshall said:
Of course, if there are other folks in the pic with her, they might
decide that's the perfect time to blink so she's the ONLY one with
her eyes open. Conundrum anyone? Back to FEL in that case. BTW - I
haven't FELd since getting the Stofen and shooting in Av locked to
200. Aperture is my ETTL FEC. ~ m²
Click to expand...
--
John from Southern California
http://www.pbase.com/johnrweb/favorite
http://www.pbase.com/domdom
F707 and 300D
 
pbleic,

So if you FEL, you can go for 16 seconds and never having to hold down any buttons including the shutter button?

This might make FEL much more usable than what the manual make it seem. I don't do FEL because the idea of holding down buttons is awkward when you're trying to compose and hold the camera steady.
pbleic said:
pbleic said:
I think pressing shutter halfway then pressing * and holding is a
bit strange but that is what the book says to do.
Click to expand...
You don't need to do this. The manual is wrong here. Chuck Westfall
has commented on this. When you let go the FEL (or AEL without
flash) holds for 16 seconds.
Click to expand...
--
John from Southern California
http://www.pbase.com/johnrweb/favorite
http://www.pbase.com/domdom
F707 and 300D
 
johnrweb said:
If you're controlling the flash through aperture, I'm wondering if
bouncing the flash is losing enough light to cause the flash to
shoot in Full Power regardless of the ETTL reading.
Click to expand...
Nah - that's a GN100 flash and if it shot at full power the people would get their eyebrows singed at a few feet, even with the Stofen.
johnrweb said:
This would explain why you can control via Aperture. So
effectively, you are in Manual Flash mode. What do you think?
Click to expand...
In a sense it seems to be so, but with ETTL assist. I still have to watch the focus point, so I do flash photography with center fp only and crop as necessary. The thing is, if I start at f8 in Av mode (locked with C.f.n to 1/200) and get a good result, then zoom in to farther subjects, the flash doesn't always power up enough to maintain the same exposure (some refer to this as part of the inconsistency I'm sure). I found that opening up a stop or two does make a difference even with ETTL supposedly factoring all this in. Manual mode on the camera would of course do the same but since the wheel is linked to ss in M it saves me from going to the button while I make adjustments. Bug or feature, I just don't need to FEL or FEC this way unless it's a very extreme circumstance I haven't yet encountered. ~ m²
--
Enjoy life - spend your clothing budget on lenses!
http://rhodeymark.instantlogic.com/PhotoGallery.ilx

 
Not in my short experience - single fp getting the subjects at x distance properly exposed is much preferable in flash photography. I really don't want any extraneous focus points adding data in this instance. FEL is a great tool, but I think most professional pjs learn to get the shot w/o it because you don't always get the chance. ~ m²
DRG said:
I know you'd argue that one shouldn't use this
method to begin with but should allow the E-TTL algorithm to have
substantial data to match against its database by using all 7 AF
points. I won't argue there - I'm just mentionin that for those set
on using central AF point, FEL is a help.
Click to expand...
--
Enjoy life - spend your clothing budget on lenses!
http://rhodeymark.instantlogic.com/PhotoGallery.ilx

 
Point the camera at the thing you want to meter off of. Push the * and let go. You have 16 secs to move the camera, half press the shutter to focus and take the picture.
johnrweb said:
So if you FEL, you can go for 16 seconds and never having to hold
down any buttons including the shutter button?

This might make FEL much more usable than what the manual make it
seem. I don't do FEL because the idea of holding down buttons is
awkward when you're trying to compose and hold the camera steady.
johnrweb said:
johnrweb said:
I think pressing shutter halfway then pressing * and holding is a
bit strange but that is what the book says to do.
Click to expand...
You don't need to do this. The manual is wrong here. Chuck Westfall
has commented on this. When you let go the FEL (or AEL without
flash) holds for 16 seconds.
Click to expand...
--
John from Southern California
http://www.pbase.com/johnrweb/favorite
http://www.pbase.com/domdom
F707 and 300D
Click to expand...
--
Paul

------------------------------------------------
Pbase supporter
Photographs at: http://www.pbase.com/pbleic
--------------------------------------------------
Copyright 2003, 2004 All rights reserved.
 
A better explanation from a post by Chuck Westfall on Rob Galbraith's forum:

Hi, Ken:

Like Walter says, there's a 16 second timer on FEL readings once they've been registered but before the shot has been taken. You can verify that FEL has been registered by observing the * symbol in the viewfinder data display. You can also extend the 16 second timer by pressing the shutter button halfway before the time runs out. However, keep in mind that FEL will be wiped out under the following conditions:

1) 2 seconds after taking a picture, unless you keep the shutter button pressed halfway after the shot.
2) letting the timer run out without pressing the shutter button halfway.

3) pressing a mode button on top of the camera like the metering pattern selector, etc.
4) shutting the camera off.

Best Regards,

Chuck Westfall
Assistant Director/Tech Info Dept.
Camera Division/Canon U.S.A., Inc.

--------------------
Chuck Westfall
Director/Technical Information Dept.
Camera Division/Canon U.S.A., Inc.
 
I'm referring to standard front curtain flash shots and by fast, I'm referring to the entire cycle. Of course, you'll see the preflash using a rear-curtain sync-enabled flash unit--that wasn't the question.
Doug Kerr said:
JThomasLambert said:
You cannot "see" the preflash because it is so fast-
Click to expand...
By "fast" do you mean "short" or do you mean "so quickly followed
by the main flash"?

If the former, that's certainly not so. The preflash can be readily
seen if you let the main flash follow after a little greater
interval than normal. You can see this with a flash unit that
allows second-curtain sync. With a shutter time of 1/25, once can
readily see that there are two separate flashes.

Best regards,

Doug

-for those that
Doug Kerr said:
blink, it's a subconscious reaction--you can't consciously pick up
both flashes with your eyes.
Jim Forbes said:
Last evening I shot about 80 indoor soccer images using the
external flash. I shot with both eyes open so I can follow the
action - takes a little practice but works - and would surely have
noticed two flash bursts for each shot - I did not.
Click to expand...
--

http://www.pbase.com/jthomaslambert
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
--

http://www.pbase.com/jthomaslambert
 
She must love you for that ;O)
Homl said:
Frank Mattia said:
Doug Kerr said:
pbleic said:
I am not an E-TTL fan, but another thread made me think about this.
FEL is the preferred method for getting good flash exposures by
pros. I find it is confusing for some subjects. However, I
BELIEVE that FEL will eliminate the other annoying feature of E-TTL
  • the preflash IMMEDIATELY before the flash itself. The one that
causes blinks.
Click to expand...
Certainly the use of FEL confers many benefits. For one, it puts
into play an the "partial" flash metering pattern which, with a
prudent choice of aiming point, made easy in the FEL situation,
appears to be attractive for many scenes.

I am a little mysitifed by your reference to the metering preflash
and its causing the subject to blink. The preflash occurs such a
short period of time before the main flash that I cannot ordinarily
distinguish the two. It is hard to believe that the subject would
react to the preflash rapidly enough to have his eyes closed by the
time of the main flash.

But do you in fact find a distinct difference in this behavior with
the preflash in effect and not? (I assume so from your premise.)

It would be interesting to do some comparison tests that did not
include the additional distraction of the FELmetering burst. One
could take some shots with E-TTL in effect, and then take shots
with the flash in manual (in which case there is no metering
preflash), having set a workable flash output level by
trial-and-error, if necessary.

Best regards,

Doug
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
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