600EX-RT--Need some good, quick settings!

[nuncle]

Greetings everyone!

     I've got a not-very-difficult-to-solve problem..but perhaps a new situation to which it applies

     I've got two Speedlite 600EX-RT's. I bought the second when the first stopped working. The second one stopped working as well. Sent it in for warranty work and it's fine. So I sent the first one in as well. It's in the shop right now.

     The issue is this: I'm leaving town this coming Tuesday for San Diego to shoot pics at Comic-Con. I'm comfortably certain there's no way that my flash will be reparied and sent back to me here in Alaska by Monday night.

     Now the potential saving grace...the repair office is only 86 miles from San Diego!  So there's a possibility I can drive and pick it up in person

     Now the problem (Sorry for the long-windedness): The whole reason I want this flash reparied is to use as a portable off camera flash setup. And Comic-Con is where I really want to do this. But I've never worked with two flashes like this before.

     So...what are the "best" settings to use for this setup? I'm envisioning the on-camera being just the transmitter, no flash. And I'm most comfortable using E-TTL. So, since I will have almost no time to play around with this before Go Time, what settings do I need to use for the on-camera "transmitter" and the off-camera flash?

     The "good" news is that this is just me, not a paying/pro gig, so there's no pressure to perform, apart from my desire to get quality shots for people.

     Thanks a ton in advance for any help you fine folks can provide!

P.S.- I do have the manual...what I'm looking for are "For Dummies" explinations and anything that's not in the manual 🙂

[RobertTheFat]

Everyone's answering the original question as though it made sense. But what I read is that the OP plans to photograph an important event using a setup he hasn't tested, indeed with he has no familiarity whatsoever. I can only say that he's got a lot more guts than I have.

[TCampbell]

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@RobertTheFat wrote:

Everyone's answering the original question as though it made sense. But what I read is that the OP plans to photograph an important event using a setup he hasn't tested, indeed with he has no familiarity whatsoever. I can only say that he's got a lot more guts than I have.

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He covered that in the original post when he said:  

The "good" news is that this is just me, not a paying/pro gig, so there's no pressure to perform, apart from my desire to get quality shots for people.

I think he's hoping to have a fun time, get some good shots, and learn a few things along the way.  He'll want to get familiar with using the E-TTL system with two lights controlling ratios, but there are planety of write-ups and videos on that so that he's not figuring it out on the spot.

Also, when using flash outdoors, even if a subject is in shade, if there's a background which is not in shade it creates an imbalance.  You'd want to meter that background and then adjust the lights to bring the light on the subject so that it's not too far from the light on the background.  Otherwise you get an over-exposed background when the subject is nicely lit... and if you bring down the exposure to prevent the background from being over-exposed, the subject is too dark.

[RobertTheFat]

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@TCampbell wrote:

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@RobertTheFat wrote:

Everyone's answering the original question as though it made sense. But what I read is that the OP plans to photograph an important event using a setup he hasn't tested, indeed with he has no familiarity whatsoever. I can only say that he's got a lot more guts than I have.

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He covered that in the original post when he said:  

The "good" news is that this is just me, not a paying/pro gig, so there's no pressure to perform, apart from my desire to get quality shots for people.

I think he's hoping to have a fun time, get some good shots, and learn a few things along the way.  He'll want to get familiar with using the E-TTL system with two lights controlling ratios, but there are planety of write-ups and videos on that so that he's not figuring it out on the spot.

Also, when using flash outdoors, even if a subject is in shade, if there's a background which is not in shade it creates an imbalance.  You'd want to meter that background and then adjust the lights to bring the light on the subject so that it's not too far from the light on the background.  Otherwise you get an over-exposed background when the subject is nicely lit... and if you bring down the exposure to prevent the background from being over-exposed, the subject is too dark.

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Well, I've found that my ability to "get quality shots for people" reaches only as far as my knowledge of my equipment does. Maybe some have outgrown that limitation, but I guess I haven't.

[Skirball]

He said in his original post that he was comfortable with eTTL.  And I'm familiar with Comic-Con, and the types of photos that come out of them.  They're usually not high-quality portrait type lighting.  Just decent well-lit "red carpet" style pics of the people who get dressed up for them.   Obviously you'd want to know how to use your equipment before you get there, but other than that, i think it's a great place to go experiment with some lighting and see what you get.  I'm assuming he'll be there for more than one day, so you can shoot, go process your photos, see what you like/don't like, and go back and try again.  Should be a great learning experience.

[nuncle]

Yes, indeed!

I shot at Comic-Con last year and got some nice shots. But you're right, the majority are "Red carpet" style photos. I did a mini shoot of a young lady outside the convention center and they turned out nice enough, but if I'd had the off camera flash setup they would've been better 🙂

I do know some lighting. I've got a full White Lightning setup at home that I get good results with. The only part of this that I have no experience with is using a flash unit as my off camera lighting...that's where the original question came from 😉

Of course, it's now quite likely this will all be a moot point. Canon didn't even get my flash checked in until yesterday

Here's some things to keep in mind if you send them something to repair...some things they don't mention to you when you fill out the online forms:

Their repair facility is not open on Saturdays. So if your item gets there then, it waits until Monday

They only make deliveries to their repair shop on Tuesdays and Thursdays!! (This is for the Irvine, CA store, don't know about any other facilities)

Depending on which phone rep you talk to, you will get different answers about the length of time it takes to check in your equipment. I got "Within 24 hours", "Within 24-48 hours" and "Up to three business days". Three different phone calls gave me these three different answers.

So, if they don't get my flash repaired by Tuesday or Wednesday, I won't be able to pick it up, and will have to take photos the same way I did last year....acceptable, but not the best they can be...

[Skirball]

 Is it at the Irvine office?  Did you call them?   Might be worth a quick phone call.

[nuncle]

Unless you have a secret number that I don't know about, that hasn't worked 😛

I've found two different numbers and they both go to the main office, somewhere on the East coast....sigh...

[RobertTheFat]

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@nuncle wrote:

Unless you have a secret number that I don't know about, that hasn't worked 😛

I've found two different numbers and they both go to the main office, somewhere on the East coast....sigh...

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I believe there are such secret numbers, but you may have to be a CPS member to use them. So if you happen to be one, it might be worth logging in and poking around.