How do I use a wide aperture with fill flash outdoors on a Canon 30D?
Asked 10/5/2010
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I’m shooting outdoor portraits with a Canon 30D and a 50mm f/1.8, using off-camera flash as fill. In bright conditions, I want to keep the aperture wide for shallow depth of field, but the camera’s flash sync speed limits how fast I can set the shutter, so I can’t open up as much as I’d like without overexposing the ambient light.
Would a neutral-density filter help in this situation? Is that the usual solution, or are there better ways to keep a wide aperture while using fill flash outdoors?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
15y ago
2 Answers
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In your shooting conditions the constraint is that a large aperture requires a very short shutter speed to expose the ambient light appropriately and you can't sync the flash faster than about 1/200 sec on the 30D. A strong ND filter might solve this problem. Alternatively, if your flash supports HSS, you can use that to reduce the exposure time (as little as 1/4000 second, I believe). If neither is available, an expedient solution is to move the location and the background into dark shade: you can still get some nice ambient light but it can be reduced several stops.
Originally by user1356. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user1356
15y ago
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Yes. The issue is that bright ambient light wants a faster shutter speed, but normal flash sync on the 30D is around 1/200s, which limits how wide you can open the aperture.
Common solutions are:
- ND filter: cuts ambient light so you can stay at sync speed and use a wider aperture. This is a standard fix.
- High-speed sync (HSS): if your flash supports it, you can use shutter speeds faster than normal sync, which is often the easiest way to shoot wide open outdoors.
- Reduce ambient light: move the subject/background into deeper shade to bring the exposure down by a few stops.
- Lower flash output: use manual flash power, diffusion, bounce, or a modifier if your flash is too strong.
There are also more specialized workarounds like shooting above sync speed with partial-frame flash coverage or using systems such as PocketWizard Hypersync, but those are less practical.
So yes, an ND filter will work and is one of the preferred approaches if you don’t have HSS.
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