# Speedlight questions



## Nigel95 (27 Nov 2017)

Hello!

I am considering a speedlight (off camera flash) to improve my macro shots (and maybe use them for FTS).

Currently my led floodlights are not giving enough light to shoot at the desired settings (FTS okay but macro not). And I don't really have space/opportunities to expand more light over it.

Someone told me that led floodlights are totally different than studiolights for photography. For example you can't compare the lumens of them both as they have a totally different effect. Is this right or just a trick to sell lights?

I want to shoot shrimp/fish at a:
diafragma of like 15
shutterspeed 1/160

Should I go expensive and go for more "easy" E-TTL shooting (I'm a beginner) or cheaper and go full manual with a yongnuo? Yongnuo suits my budget better than a canon 430ex for example

What is recommended for aquarium photography? Optical or radio trigger?

Currently looking for the yongnuo 560 iv. If I ever expand to two flashes can I trigger them both with just one yongnuo RF-603?

Also ideas are welcome, how to put the flash (safe) above the tank w/o falling. No really space for tripods beside.


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## Danny (27 Nov 2017)

Flash will just bounce off the glass, get a constant light source in the 6500k range.


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## Nigel95 (27 Nov 2017)

Danny said:


> Flash will just bounce off the glass, get a constant light source in the 6500k range.



Even when positioned above? I have a constant light source of 4250 lumens on my small tank and 8500 on 80cm tank. Not enough...


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## zozo (27 Nov 2017)

Nigel95 said:


> Someone told me that led floodlights are totally different than studiolights for photography


These are actualy momentary statements, what someone said 3 months ago can be completely different today when it comes to LED light. This is improving in such a fast pace that even the parallel inustries making use of LED technology can't keep up with it. They develop and produce a LED product and the darn thing aint properly reviewed by the public newer beter performing LED technologies are already rolling out of the lab. So chances are 90% you buy something outdated that is 6 months previously build with 6 month old led technology. 

I'm prettyy sure there are led units at the moment getting pretty close to metal halide, but maybe not as a complete product with casing and reflector etc. But just a single LED unit on it's own still in need of a solid casing with a proper cooling. That's where the work recides, the led is peanuts, build into something practical is what you figure out yourself.

https://www.banggood.com/150W-15000...00mm-For-Flood-Light-AC110220V-p-1173608.html

These are already around for a few months.  I got one, it's a beast of a light, 2 minutes and you can bake ham and eggs on it. Yet didn't do anything usefull with it.. But if you have an excisting aloy casing able to cool it, you'l be surpriced, it has an awfull strong performance.


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## Nigel95 (27 Nov 2017)

zozo said:


> https://www.banggood.com/150W-15000...00mm-For-Flood-Light-AC110220V-p-1173608.html



Pretty cheap and what a beast of lumens! I have my current led floodlights where I could place them in. Problem is I am not really handy with this. How do I know if my aloy casing is cooling it?

Currently I have this 
https://nl.aliexpress.com/item/LED-...-1716-4ce4-aa52-35274a06e9da&rmStoreLevelAB=5


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## zozo (27 Nov 2017)

Nigel95 said:


> How do I know if my aloy casing is cooling it?



Good question, i don't know.. But with leds it is pretty straight forward, if it gets to hot the light starts to flicker within a few minutes. That's a sign of overheating.

Lately i did build a hood with these for an indoor pond setup in the cellar.
https://www.banggood.com/45-X-160MM...Bead-For-Flood-Light-AC110220V-p-1124765.html

The hood din't cool it enough and had to build a forced fan cooling for it to make it work.

I guess that's the cheapest option to create a fan cooling. With a heatsink only, you would need a pretty darn huge heatsink. And these are rare and expensive.


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## Edvet (27 Nov 2017)

As a beginner i would go for TTL flashgear. Start with one and connect it to the camera with a dedicated cord, this way you'll still have TTL measuring, but can hold it above the tank or at an angle.

Also you casn use it "regularly"for family pics and so by bouncing it of the cealing or wall


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## Nigel95 (27 Nov 2017)

Edvet said:


> As a beginner i would go for TTL flashgear. Start with one and connect it to the camera with a dedicated cord, this way you'll still have TTL measuring, but can hold it above the tank or at an angle.
> 
> Also you casn use it "regularly"for family pics and so by bouncing it of the cealing or wall



Any recommendations of brand and type?


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## Edvet (27 Nov 2017)

Easiest is staying with the camerabrand; connections, communications etc work out of the box


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## Nigel95 (27 Nov 2017)

Edvet said:


> As a beginner i would go for TTL flashgear. Start with one and connect it to the camera with a dedicated cord, this way you'll still have TTL measuring, but can hold it above the tank or at an angle.
> 
> Also you casn use it "regularly"for family pics and so by bouncing it of the cealing or wall



Whats the max power/ guide number we need for macro/aquarium photography?

Is it possible to trigger 2 flashes with just a cord?

So basically going manual will be a lot cheaper with the cost of speedlights and the trigger. But it is more hard?

Hard to choose... what route should I go more expensive and easier or harder and cheaper..

I assume the cord is only handy for macro photography. When doing full tank shot it will be visible right on the picture right?


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## tmiravent (27 Nov 2017)

Hi Nigel,
you can go for yongnuo, or any brand you like €€€€
These flash deliver the same output like, canon, nikon, etc.
my advice, go for TTL.
the Triggers are usefull for TTL with wireless, but be prepared, lots of batteries
You can use a TTL cable also.
Using flash in photography has a learning curve, take some time but it's a big upgrade.
I always use flash for contest photos, 3 yongnou or 2 cheap studio +1 yongnou for backlight.
cheers


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## Nigel95 (27 Nov 2017)

tmiravent said:


> Hi Nigel,
> you can go for yongnuo, or any brand you like €€€€
> These flash deliver the same output like, canon, nikon, etc.
> my advice, go for TTL.
> ...



Which yongnuos do you have?

Is it possible to use a TTL cable with 2 off camera flashes and that they are not in the view of the FTS ?

Someone told me TTL isn’t really worth it in aquarium photography as TTL cant get a correct Reading through water etc.?


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## ceg4048 (27 Nov 2017)

Hi,
    If you are shooting in raw you should be able to recover data easily in your image program. All this flash gear orgy seems a bit OTT to me. 
Edvert might have a different opinion but I don't use any supplemental lighting, strictly tank lighting (although I don't know what kind of lighting your tank has) and I can bring back details in Photoshop without too much noise using just tank lighting. The only trick is getting the color balance right and if you have a white card and Custom WB function in your camera then it's a piece of cake.

Here is a macro image using tank lighting only f11 1/50th ISO 400 - Nikon 105 Macro lens. Of course I turned all the filters off to reduce swaying of the leaves, I could have easily opened up the aperture to stop action, but yeah, f11.

The advantage of tank lighting only is that you are better able to isolate your subject because of the rapid light falloff in the distance. It's a natural vignette.

Different courses for horses, but I would spend money on a) fast lens and b) Photoshop or Lightroom first before considering all this extra gear.



 

Cheers,


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## tmiravent (28 Nov 2017)

Nigel95 said:


> Which yongnuos do you have?
> I have two YN560-III , that are not TTL and one YN568EX, the TTL one!
> 
> Is it possible to use a TTL cable with 2 off camera flashes and that they are not in the view of the FTS ?
> ...


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## tmiravent (28 Nov 2017)

ceg4048 said:


> Hi,
> If you are shooting in raw you should be able to recover data easily in your image program. All this flash gear orgy seems a bit OTT to me.
> Edvert might have a different opinion but I don't use any supplemental lighting, strictly tank lighting (although I don't know what kind of lighting your tank has) and I can bring back details in Photoshop without too much noise using just tank lighting. The only trick is getting the color balance right and if you have a white card and Custom WB function in your camera then it's a piece of cake.
> 
> ...


I also shot macro and FTS with aquarium light, but for best quality flash makes the difference.
With flash light you 'can get', soft to hard light, low iso, different DOF, very low noise, and cleaner images (but you have to know how to use the gear).
Working with the light that you got have some advantages, you're used to the light (color, behavior, etc) and you normally you get what you see.
With flash you have the learning curve, and adapt to predict what you're going to get!
Try to shoot a 1 cm fish (not a snail) with your macro, at 1:1 without flash...not easy!
I agree with Clive:
- LR or PS are very important, you should have one of them.
- Good lens also make a difference.
- Try to buy gear that you use for other purpose (family, landscape, etc)


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## tmiravent (28 Nov 2017)

Not the perfect photo but:



It seem's freeze (that's flash) but it wasn't! The corydora was swimming and fast!

I shoot this one with YN560-III, manual mode.
ISO 200 | speed 1/125 | ƒ/13.0 | MicroNikkor 60.0 mm


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## Nigel95 (28 Nov 2017)

ceg4048 said:


> don't use any supplemental lighting, strictly tank lighting (although I don't know what kind of lighting your tank has



My tanks are pretty low light like 30 par and I put the tanklight up 30 cm above the tank to get the white background. I am a beginner so this could be but I find it very hard to shoot decent pictures with this output of light.



ceg4048 said:


> Different courses for horses, but I would spend money on a) fast lens and b) Photoshop or Lightroom first before considering all this extra gear



I do have the canon 60mm f2.8 usm macro and photoshop. But I am pretty sure I don't get everything out of this program. Do you have any advice which tools in photoshop are great for aquarium photography?



tmiravent said:


> Not the perfect photo but:



I love it 



tmiravent said:


> (but you have to know how to use the gear)



I am up for a challenge but it has to be doable for a beginner to..

I asked a lot of people and I still can't choose between manual or TTL. It's like 50/50..

Here is my first macro shot session but the shrimp is not in full focus + it lacks in sharpness IMO.


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## Edvet (28 Nov 2017)

1) low light means either long shuttertime (unsharp due to moving either you or subject) or large diafragma (very small depth of field, shown here by having focus on the pellet at his tail)
2) try to focus on the eyes.
3) are you using a tripod?
4) could be you have wrong focus, if you did focus on the eyes (the are programs which show you where the focuspoint was) and the camera is of a bit you could have "backfocus"or "frontfocus". In some cameras you can change that in the software. Take pictures of a ruler, focus on one spot and see how the pic looks afterward
example of backfocus:

 , focused on the black, focus comes out behind it


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## Nigel95 (28 Nov 2017)

Edvet said:


> are you using a tripod?



Nope it was hand held. The problem with my tripod (don't have a monopod) is I can't get close to the glass and I find it hand held much easier to move around. That's why I want more light / flash so I can use better shutterspeeds like 1/200.


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## Edvet (28 Nov 2017)

Use tripod as a monopod?


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## Nigel95 (28 Nov 2017)

Edvet said:


> Use tripod as a monopod?



Lol yeah thats possible to


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## doylecolmdoyle (28 Nov 2017)

What ISO are you using? I bump it up to 1600 for my macro shots, also they are all shot hand held, no tripod. Personally i recommend the Canon 430EX, i have been using it for all my macro photos, i just attached it to the camera and dont have any problems with reflection on the glass, tho I think to avoid reflection the photo needs to be taken at 90 degree to the glass, if I try take the photo on an angle I get reflections. This is one of my fav shots, you can see the camera settings on flickr

ƒ/8.0
1/160
ISO - 1600
Flash (on, fired)

IMG_0645 by Colm Doyle, on Flickr

Also look into focus modes, if you camera has AI Servo AF mode for focusing on moving objects that really helps


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## Nigel95 (28 Nov 2017)

doylecolmdoyle said:


> What ISO are you using?



Around 800 - 1600



doylecolmdoyle said:


> Also look into focus modes, if you camera has AI Servo AF mode for focusing on moving objects that really helps



I thought manual is the way to go? Do you guys use autofocus? 

Great pic!


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## Danny (28 Nov 2017)

Nigel95 said:


> Around 800 - 1600
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Trying to manual focus on a moving subject in macro is extremely hard, AI servo is the way to go so it tracks the subject.


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## ceg4048 (28 Nov 2017)

Nigel95 said:


> I do have the canon 60mm f2.8 usm macro and photoshop. But I am pretty sure I don't get everything out of this program. Do you have any advice which tools in photoshop are great for aquarium photography?


Hi,
   Well it's a wide open field, and yes, one could probably spend years on PS and still only scratch the surface.
First things first; Shoot in raw and not jpeg. When you open a raw file in PS it will open the Camera Raw module where you can recover exposure and adjust color temperature. There are a ton of other sub modules in camera raw such as vibrance and saturation settings, curves...a ton of features. Then you can open the file in the main module and carry on from there. You never actually change the raw file when you manipulate it in Camera Raw. You only write an XMP type file, kind of like a filter, so you can always change your mind the next time you open the file.

Also, use layers, probably one of the most powerful tools. Apply different changes on different layers which allows you to change your mind without destroying the base image or removing all the other changes you made to the image.

Also things like Luminosity Masks and even LUTs can be applied to the image.

Just the tip of the iceberg, really...

Cheers,


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## tmiravent (29 Nov 2017)

As Clive said, RAW is they  way to go, if you want to take the most of your camera!
Actually is funny to see that when you shoot raw the cheapest cameras perform very similar the €€€ ones...
The extra space that you need for storage worth every terabyte!
I try to be very simple in processing, just push 4 or 5 buttons in cameraraw!

Putting light in the right place takes time to learn, but it's the key to great images.
Blocking, reflecting and diffusing are basics to control light.
Cheap stuff is enought to do this and it's funn.
You have the gear, enjoy!
cheers


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## doylecolmdoyle (29 Nov 2017)

Nigel95 said:


> Around 800 - 1600
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Cheers, you could shoot manual on a fairly still shrimp but for anything moving try use AI Servo, give it a google, watch some videos, great for tracking and keeping focus on anything that moves. Tho its pretty tricky when you have 30+ micro fish all buzzing around as the camera will jump focus from fish to fish as they swim into frame.

When I take macro shots I take like 100 - 200 shots and get maybe 5 decent shots, sometimes 0, its really had to tell just how well focused the shots are on the camera and you only really can tell when you start to process them on the computer.


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## Nigel95 (29 Nov 2017)

ceg4048 said:


> Also, use layers, probably one of the most powerful tools. Apply different changes on different layers which allows you to change your mind without destroying the base image or removing all the other changes you made to the image.



I already shoot in RAW etc. The auto focus is worth a try to but this is something I didn't think of. Gonna try it!


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