Perplexed by Pop-Up Flash: Just sitting around in front of a nice fire on a chilly spring night, camera in hand, Darrell Young's tome on Mastering the D600 open to a rather dull...

NoSocks Loc: quonochontaug, rhode island

Just sitting around in front of a nice fire on a chilly spring night, camera in hand, Darrell Young's tome on Mastering the D600 open to a rather dull chapter on file naming, and decide to take a couple of shots of a nearby couch pillow to examine focus results. The pillow is needlepoint and therefore provides a decent opportunity to look at detail and sharpness. With the lens extended out fully to 300 mm, I click off a shot from about three feet at 1/60 and f5.6, ISO on auto and look at the pleasingly sharp results on the screen. Colors a bit washed out due, I suppose, to an ounce of overexposure, but this isn't for National Geographic, and I am looking at sharpness, not shades of blue. Then I hit the button for the pop-up flash, take another shot, and am very surprised to see a picture so grossly under exposed as to be almost impossible to make out. Dark with hardly a hint of an image. Surprised with this result, I took a couple more with the same outcome. I don't get it. Any thoughts Hogs?

tbell7D Loc: Houston

I'm not expert enough to offer a instant cure to this, but from what you said, the first thing I would try would be to set your ISO to a specific value instead of auto and try the flash shot again. With perhaps a bit of trial & error, i.e. different ISO settings, you should see some improvement.

MT Shooter Loc: Montana

I would guess that at such a short distance with such a long lens that the lens blocked any of the light from the flash from actually illuminating the subject, resulting in the apparent underexposure.

Wahawk Loc: NE IA

MT Shooter wrote:

I would guess that at such a short distance with such a long lens that the lens blocked any of the light from the flash from actually illuminating the subject, resulting in the apparent underexposure.

:thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:
Pop up flash not much good once you start taking closeups at minimum focus range with extended telephotos! Personally I would not use the popup flash on any dSLR when the lens is set much beyond 100-150mm range and that is really pushing it if you are trying to close focus on something.

NoSocks Loc: quonochontaug, rhode island

Wahawk wrote:

:thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:
Pop up flash not much good once you start taking closeups at minimum focus range with extended telephotos! Personally I would not use the popup flash on any dSLR when the lens is set much beyond 100-150mm range and that is really pushing it if you are trying to close focus on something.

I normally only use the pop up in commander mode with an sb700 off camera but was just fooling around and was surprised by the results.

NoSocks Loc: quonochontaug, rhode island

tbell7D wrote:

I'm not expert enough to offer a instant cure to this, but from what you said, the first thing I would try would be to set your ISO to a specific value instead of auto and try the flash shot again. With perhaps a bit of trial & error, i.e. different ISO settings, you should see some improvement.

I did as you suggested and got available light and flash to work at ISO 1000. Real shooting I wouldn't face this, but it was just kind of interesting to get the results I did. So your suggestion fixed it but I still don't understand the why of the experience. I would have figured MT was right because he so often is, but I did get the flash to work even with the lens all the way out.

tbell7D Loc: Houston

I'm glad to know that my suggestion was helpful. Honestly, this was a bit of guess work on my part. With that said, I would like to know why you would set your ISO to "auto". My 7D also has this feature, but I have never used it. What advantage might this option offer? Thanks in advance.

NoSocks Loc: quonochontaug, rhode island

tbell7D wrote:

I'm glad to know that my suggestion was helpful. Honestly, this was a bit of guess work on my part. With that said, I would like to know why you would set your ISO to "auto". My 7D also has this feature, but I have never used it. What advantage might this option offer? Thanks in advance.

I can set ISO to auto with a maximum value and minimum shutter speed. it makes taking available light snaps of the grandkids indoors an easy task. the D600 performs very well with minimal noise up to ISO 6400. and it will go that high if needed. But it will set itself much lower depending on ambient light. When shooting other than snapshots of the kids, I try to do all my settings manually, but I have a long way to go and a huge amount to learn.

Erik_H Loc: Denham Springs, Louisiana

Just wondering, could you have inadvertently had some negative flash compensation dialed in?

tbell7D Loc: Houston

Thanks for the feedback.

NoSocks Loc: quonochontaug, rhode island

Xtreme66 wrote:

Just wondering, could you have inadvertently had some negative flash compensation dialed in?

could be. I didn't check that.

BHC Loc: Strawberry Valley, JF, USA

Which 300 do you have. I don't believe any focus closer than 4.8 feet.

ph0t0bug

This is probably not what your problem is, but I once had trouble getting my flash to work in a cave, and when I came out I suddenly realized I had forgotten I had a ball cap on and the flash was trying to pop up but kept hitting the brim! Duh!! It was the 1st time I ever wore a ball cap.

sportyman140 Loc: Juliette, GA

quonnie wrote:

Just sitting around in front of a nice fire on a c... (show quote)

The flash is controlled by Aperture and the Ambient light is controlled by Shutter Speed. You Shutter speed was too high and/or Aperture was closed too much. Got a Shutter speed instead of 1/60 to 1/4 or more. Your aperture is probably as low as it can go so change your SS and also raise you ISO to 200 or 400. That should help allot. I would read the Book by Bryan Peterson "Understanding Flash Photography" It will help allot.

JBTaylor Loc: In hiding again

I would still guess that the light from the pop-up flash was blocked by the fully extended zoom lens in this case.