11 Nov, 2002

Event Shoot with Canon D30, Fisheye & 550EX

By Rico Tudor I covered a business event with the D30, EF 15mm fisheye and 550EX. I wished to capture an immersive view with many faces in every shot. I chose digital over film because mixed-lighting situations are easily managed with immediate feedback. The 550EX can project plenty of light, recharges quickly, and has a built-in diffuser panel for the fisheye.

Of all EF lenses, the 15mm gives widest coverage and, being a fisheye, avoids unpleasant facial distortions at the edge-of-frame. This lens allows hand-held shutter speeds of 1/15s. A slow shutter speed was used to maximize the interior lighting and the (failing) natural light. This gave a more natural effect, and opened the deeper recesses of the venue. Motion blur from the available light created a lively ambience, while flash provided the detail. A fisheye combined with apertures of f/4-5.6 delivers awesome DOF.

For the shoot, D30 was kept in manual exposure mode, ISO 400, AWB, one-shot, Large/Fine.

E-TTL was applied rigorously, with manual selection of AF point. This was painful because my style sans flash is to use the center-point only, and recompose. Given the scene dynamics, FEL was out; I also wanted to minimize the pyrotechnics.

While wanting it at times, I avoided manual-focus mode because it causes E-TTL to use some kind of averaging. This is not documented in the D30 or 550EX manuals, and I haven't explored the behavior.

I'm not a fan of bounced flash. If available at all, the surface will control the color and strength of your lighting. As you move around, the light path may be cut by pillars or other obstructions. While direct flash is too harsh, I find the quality of 100% bounced-light to be overly soft.

An interesting facet of the 550EX is evident from the pics below. According to Canon documentation, the diffuser panel is designed to offer 17° flash coverage. Not mentioned is the light quality, which the diffuser improves markedly -- like a soft box. There is an impact on flash range, but the 550EX has a lot of power.

Even with diffuser, the 550EX cannot match the full-frame coverage of the 15mm fisheye. From earlier experiments, I know the D30/fisheye combo works -- barely. The 1.3X crop of the 1D will probably cause corner vignetting.

Pics below are ordered chronologically. In keeping with this technical presentation, they are unprocessed (no cropping, leveling, sharpening, etc). They are scaled 25% linear to fit on this web page, but click on any pic to get the original 1.4 MB JPEG.

1/60s, f/4 1st shot of the event showed that 1/60s was not enough to capture ambient light. Flash was metered off speaker's back.

1/15s, f/4 Ambient light is much better at 1/15s. Burn-out at left shows how much flash power is going into the center.

1/15s, f/4 Minimize burn-out by keeping everyone at the same distance: this is not always possible in a crowd.

1/15s, f/4 Good motion blur.

1/15s, f/4 Speaker is resisting fisheye curvature. At 1/15s, the overhead monitor is clearly resolved.

1/15s, f/4 Perfect flash lighting.

1/15s, f/5.6 At this point, I started a series of "crane shots": stand in the middle of a crowd, and hoist the camera high. With a fisheye, you really can't miss. I stopped down for more DOF. The only problem is E-TTL, which may fix on something other than a mid-tone. Sub-optimal exposures were about 25%.

1/15s, f/5.6 A bit bright, but fun viewing angle. And, no, I'm not standing on furniture. I admit, averaged flash metering would serve well in this situation.

1/15s, f/5.6 I like.

1/15s, f/5.6 A subtle problem that called for 2nd-curtain sync.

1/15s, f/5.6 Same scene again, but this time the "crane shot" is overlit: focus point must have landed on something dark. Exposure of outdoors is unaffected.

1/15s, f/5.6

1/15s, f/5.6 Deep focus, excellent head count.

1/15s, f/5.6 Needs another 1/2 stop all-around. At ISO 400, there is no exposure latitude, so shadow detail is gone.

1/15s, f/5.6

1/15s, f/5.6 A open scene reveals more lines of the room, and the fisheye effects.

1/30s, f/5.6 Same scene again, but I switched to the EF 28/2.8, bumped the shutter, and stood back. Lines are straight, but subject feels remote. I also retracted the diffuser.

1/30s, f/5.6 Light without diffuser has a harsh quality.

1/60s, f/4	1st shot of the event showed that 1/60s was not enough to capture ambient light. Flash was metered off speaker's back.
1/15s, f/4	Ambient light is much better at 1/15s. Burn-out at left shows how much flash power is going into the center.
1/15s, f/4	Minimize burn-out by keeping everyone at the same distance: this is not always possible in a crowd.
1/15s, f/4	Good motion blur.
1/15s, f/4	Speaker is resisting fisheye curvature. At 1/15s, the overhead monitor is clearly resolved.
1/15s, f/4	Perfect flash lighting.
1/15s, f/5.6	At this point, I started a series of "crane shots": stand in the middle of a crowd, and hoist the camera high. With a fisheye, you really can't miss. I stopped down for more DOF. The only problem is E-TTL, which may fix on something other than a mid-tone. Sub-optimal exposures were about 25%.
1/15s, f/5.6	A bit bright, but fun viewing angle. And, no, I'm not standing on furniture. I admit, averaged flash metering would serve well in this situation.
1/15s, f/5.6	I like.
1/15s, f/5.6	A subtle problem that called for 2nd-curtain sync.
1/15s, f/5.6	Same scene again, but this time the "crane shot" is overlit: focus point must have landed on something dark. Exposure of outdoors is unaffected.
1/15s, f/5.6
1/15s, f/5.6	Deep focus, excellent head count.
1/15s, f/5.6	Needs another 1/2 stop all-around. At ISO 400, there is no exposure latitude, so shadow detail is gone.
1/15s, f/5.6
1/15s, f/5.6	A open scene reveals more lines of the room, and the fisheye effects.
1/30s, f/5.6	Same scene again, but I switched to the EF 28/2.8, bumped the shutter, and stood back. Lines are straight, but subject feels remote. I also retracted the diffuser.
1/30s, f/5.6	Light without diffuser has a harsh quality.