This week, I got two questions related to indoor events photography. The questions are basically the same, how to take good picture in low light event?.
There are two ways to solve this problem. First, is to get a lens with big aperture, such as f/2.8 or greater. Second, is to get external flash, and the third is to get the lens and the flash.
If I only can choose one, I will choose the external flash because it will work in most of the situation.
Here is the advantages of using external flash:
- You can override ambient light and illuminate faces evenly.
- You can bounce the flash to the ceiling (if there is any) to illuminate the whole room
- You can use flash off the hot shoe to create directional light.
- You can freeze motion
- You can use it with diffuser to get a softer, more natural light.
When you plan to get an external flash, look at the one which can swivel, so you can bounce or direct the flash head. For example: Nikon SB600 and Canon Speedlite 430EX II.
.. and here is the advantages of using low light lens:
- You will retain ambient light so your picture will look more natural
- You will have shallower depth of field, therefore you can blur the background. This could be a weakness too, especially if you want everything in focus.
- Lens or camera with image stabilization will help in shooting non moving object but helpless when shooting moving objects.
So, how about the camera? is the camera matter? yes, in same degree. For example, DSLR camera will be better than compact camera because the differences in their sensor size, but comparing one DSLR camera (with the same sensor size) will not significantly affect image quality in low light situation.
Other tips on low light indoor photography
- When using a DSLR camera, don’t be afraid on setting high ISO, such as 800 or 1600.
- When using flash and DSLR camera, high ISO can help you to register more ambient light into the picture. However, if you don’t like the ambient light, set ISO to low, around 200 or 400.
- Use flash diffuser most of the time, especially shooting in high-ceiling or non-white ceiling room.
Hopefully this will help.
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This was very useful, thanks!
Although I vaguely knew some of the items myself, it’s nice to have the pros and cons listed!
Sometimes you cant use the flash (ie performances dance etc) – I tried the wide open aperture lens option with no flash and it worked, but I was still a bit too new at this to understand how shallow the DOF was a result.
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