Blown away by my new 5D3

[Bennymiata]

I used my new 5D3 in anger for the first time last night, when I did a job for a big birthday party at the Bonnie Doon golf club.

Was a great night, and I was just a little nervous at using a new camera for a paid job, although I did take my 60D with me as a back-up.
I have found that the white balance of the 60D is not always right, but the 5D3 is just about perfect.

The camera was superb!
The focussing is amazing, and out of 560 photos, only 3 photos were slightly out of focus, which was probably my fault.
The venue was very dark, and I used my 580EXII flash bouncing it off the ceiling, which I find the best method in these circumstances as people are happy to be photographed and it doesn't give them red eyes.

Here's a few shots from the night, all taken from the jpegs (but of course I will process all the photos later from the RAWs), straight out of the camera with NO adjustments whatsoever. They are very low res too.

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[geoffsta]

Congrats on your new purchase. And not bad pics for low res.

[larrywen]

good work and I am sure your client is happy with them too.

[Bennymiata]

Thanks guys.
I hope the client will be happy, but it wil take me a week to process all the pics, + about 20 minutes of HD video, then make up a slide show for them and make a DVD with the shots, video and music.
This was a return job from a family that I've done this for previously, so they must have been happy with the last job I did for them.

When I've finished this job, I'll put it up on Yout Tube and post a link to it on the forum for all to see.

[Fedgrub]

Very jealous of your purchase, Benny. I agree the mkiii feels SUPER nice.

[ameerat42]

Benny. You should constantly check your shield harmonics. Being blown away by the likes of can(n)on is do Waterloo!!!
(Um-mm-mm.)

[Film Street]

That flash is not bounced off the ceiling.

[ricktas]

I agree with filmstreet, the shadowing under chins, around faces etc, does not look like those of flash that is bounced off the ceiling.

[Bennymiata]

Sorry to say, but the flash is defintely bounced off the ceiling.

I use the little white card also, which bounces the light around a bit, but if I used direct flash at a party, no-one would want their picture taken, and using bounced flash, you don't get red-eye either.
Direct flash would have also shown up a lot more hot spots on their faces.

The room was pretty dark, so the flash virtually lit up the whole room.

The only time during the party that I used direct flash, was when I took pictures outside, where there was nothingot bounce the flash off, but all of these were taken indoors.

If you look closely at #1,2 and 3, you can see just a little bit of shadowing under the chin.

Perhaps I also know how to use a bounced flash to best its effect.

[Film Street]

Bounced flash. Used to create some shadow and balance exposure of the subject and environment. Be careful using bounce cards. If you are closer to your subject than the ceiling the light reflected from the bounce card can override the bounce if your card is set too high. If I ever use the card, I have it up only a couple of millimeters and only if I'm getting too much shadow under the eye.

[Bennymiata]

Depends on what angle you have the flash-head at too.
You can see more bounced flash pictures http://www.ausphotography.net.au/forum/showthread.php?108235-Party-Shots

[swifty]

Not saying you didn't bounce the flash or anything but I must admit, the shadows in most of these definitely looks like direct flash. Eg. the last pic with the gentleman holding the glass. The shadow of his hand is directly behind him.
I would normally expect bounce flash results to be more like the example film street posted.

[Bennymiata]

They're definitely all bounced.
I should know, I took them!

Here's a couple of shots of the night that were direct flash.

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With the right technique and flash setting, the results should be similar if the flash is bounced or direct.
Using the right angle on the flash head, together with the diffuser, providing the height of the ceiling is taken into account, a bounced flash should give you a nice even light.
I also use a relatively slow shutter speed of 1/60th second, so the light from the flash has time to bounce around and light the subjects more evenly.

[Fedgrub]

I don't know what the deal is with whether it was bounced or not. I thought the point of this thread was for us all to get jealous of your 5Dmkiii :(

[Bennymiata]

Jealousy was not my intention here, as many of you out there have far better equipment than I have, but just to show some examples of how happy I am with the 5D3.

In previous jobs like this that I have done with my 60D, I had to do quite a bit of PP on the images, mainly to fix white balance, but the auto white balance on the 5D3 is excellent, and I hardly had to make any adjustments, and the low light focussing is amazing.

I guess like many threads, it tends to go off the rails a bit, but I guess that is what makes forums like this so much fun.

[arthurking83]

...... but I guess that is what makes forums like this so much fun.

I'd use the term .. interesting .. but it is fun as well.

As with life in general, conversation turns from one topic to another and information flows.
That's the point of forums as well .. it's just like real life ... "only crunchy!!" :D

One point leads to another topic which then transpires into another debate, which finally turns into a semi related argument, which subsequently sees someone bow out in a huff.

FWIW: I don't think the flash was 100% bounced. While it may have been bounced, it may have been angled or tilted more towards the front(ie. 45° or something).
Light can't defy the laws of physics, and if the shadows are anything to go by, the bulk of the light source was primarily front on.

Film Street's image shows more of a bounce effect, where you'd expect that the flash head was primarily pointed towards the ceiling and the shadows are formed with the primary light source coming from higher up and so the shadow is cast from above. Also the more diffuse reflected light from what can safely be assumed is a white ceiling has cast a much softer shadow(less defined).
Bennymiata's images have stronger shadow forming with more defined edges compared to Film's bounced flash sample.

The other thing of note George, is did you use a higher/highish ISO value than baseISO?(no exif in the images).

[Bennymiata]

I used an ISO setting of 800 on most of the images, and yes, the flash was at about a 45 degree angle and the white bounce card does push some of the light directly on the subject.

After much experimentation, I find this system gives the best, and most realistic results with limited shadowing in dimly lit rooms, but obviously, it doesn't work well outdoors.

[mpb]

I bounced a flash off the floor once.

I won't do that again, it never worked again. :o

I will be more careful next time.

[arthurking83]

I used an ISO setting of 800 on most of the images, and yes, the flash was at about a 45 degree angle and the white bounce card does push some of the light directly on the subject.

....

OK, makes sense.

At 45°, the direct light produced from the flash + bounce card provides more of the lighting effect than the reflected light off the ceiling can provide.

So imagine, at approximately 45° the direct light coming from the flash is going to be say(as an example) 2 or 3x stronger(or brighter) than the reflected light from the ceiling.
(that's just the nature of light, and even a mirror will lose some of the light it reflects back at 'ya).

Hence the light appears to be predominantly coming from front on, and why the comments doubting the use of bounced flash.

[vk2gwk]

I also use a relatively slow shutter speed of 1/60th second, so the light from the flash has time to bounce around and light the subjects more evenly

I don't think the shutterspeed comes anywhere close to the speed of light with which that light bounces around the room..... :)

[Bennymiata]

I don't think the shutterspeed comes anywhere close to the speed of light with which that light bounces around the room..... :)

Absolutely correct, but the slower shutter speed allows the room lighting to have some effect.
The faster the shutter speed, the darker the background.

[Shelley]

Congrats on the camera. I also have this beautiful camera and I bought it when I damaged my 5d2, so I wasn't overly excited about it as it when into my lens fund. But when I got it I was amazed at the clarity and lack of noise compared to my 7d (which I didn't really notice until I got this camera).

I find I cannot get clear BIF with the focus system - but it could be a setup issue on my part as I more-or-less set it same as my 7d.

[Warbler]

I've got one of these (5DIII) arriving next week myself so looking forward to giving it a run. You know, the much-maligned Fong-Dong is really quite good at diffusing on-camera flash in these situations. Simply bouncing of flat surfaces doesn't always provide the best solution.

[Bennymiata]

Shelley, there's lots of stuff about the 5D3 focussing system on the web.
It can be complex, but once you read through a few things and try them out, they become pretty clear.
There are so many settings, you just have to find the right one for your uses.

Personally, I find the focussing extremely good and very, very fast even in very dim light.
In fact, in some of the shots in this post, all I could see through the viewfinder was black, yet the camera focussed perfectly every time.

[I @ M]

Possibly one of the better articles regarding Canon AF that I have read is this one (http://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2012/08/autofocus-reality-part-3b-canon-cameras). If you don't want to hash through the tech details, head straight to the summary which as I much expected tells you that if you want the best AF from the newest bodies then you have to buy the newest lenses.

[Eberbachl]

The shadows in the first set certainly look like direct flash. Hard edged dark shadows, directly behind hands and fingers and under the rim of chins etc.... now it makes sense that you say it wasn't bounced straight off the ceiling, but angled 45° towards the subject, with a bounce card. ;) Most of the light is coming directly from the flash, and not the ceiling.

Film Street's example shows a nice use of bounced flash in my opinion, broader, lighter and softer shadows that show the dominant light coming from above and diffused nicely.


With the right technique and flash setting, the results should be similar if the flash is bounced or direct.

No they shouldn't. That's precisely why we bounce flash; to get away from the direct flash look.

:D