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How To Use Flash On Film Camera

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Written by John Adams 3

Using flash units with quondam analog cameras tin can seem like a super daunting task.

How are you supposed to make a brand new wink work with a camera originally fabricated in 1969 or earlier?

Thankfully, there are a few tricks to make your journey into flash photography with film super uncomplicated.

How to Use Flash with Film Photography
How to Use Flash with Film Photography
How to Use Flash with Film Photography
Medium format black and white film image of a woman smiling with her hand over her head - How to Use Flash with Film Photography by John Adams III on Shoot It With Film

Let me begin by saying I am not an expert in using flash, nor practise I believe my method of using flash with moving-picture show to be the best way or even the correct way. I simply want to share with you lot guys the method I've plant to be the most user-friendly!

I recently picked up a Neewer S300N wink unit with a pair of Neewer Wireless Flash Triggers with the intention of learning how to incorporate flash into my workflow.

Using flash was something I was scared to use for a long time.

The biggest question I had before starting was, How do I meter for my scene when using wink? And how do I avoid overexposing everything? The answer? Your digital camera!

Find the Neewer S300N flash on Amazon.

Medium format black and white film image of a portrait of a woman - How to Use Flash with Film Photography by John Adams III on Shoot It With Film

Using Your Digital Camera as a Calorie-free Meter

This may seem like a foreign concept, but it'south actually used by a lot of people. Using a digital camera as a calorie-free meter with your flash is a great option for a few reasons:

  1. Quality of the digital camera doesn't matter. You're just using this to check the light. Many tin can exist had for a couple hundred bucks on eBay. My very beginning photographic camera, the Catechism Insubordinate T2i, tin can exist had for less than $200!
  2. Firsthand feedback on your lighting. Is the power of your flash too vivid? Does shooting at f4 look ameliorate than at f8? These are things y'all can check and right immediately before burning through your precious motion-picture show.
Medium format film image of a portrait of a woman - How to Use Flash with Film Photography by John Adams III on Shoot It With Film
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My Workflow when Working with Wink and Pic

Connecting Your Flash Triggers

I brainstorm by plugging in and turning on my Neewer S300N flash unit.

One trigger will plug into the flash, gear up to the "Flash" mode. The other trigger will slide onto the hot shoe on meridian of my digital photographic camera, as well fix to the "Wink" mode.

I'll then press the shutter simply to ensure the connectedness is in that location and that the flash fires.

Neewer S300N flash - Hot shoe and trigger attached to a hotshoe on the Mamiya RZ67 - How to Use Flash with Film Photography by John Adams III on Shoot It With Film
The Neewer S300N Flash
Hot shoe and trigger attached to a hotshoe on a digital camera - How to Use Flash with Film Photography by John Adams III on Shoot It With Film
Attaching the flash trigger to my digital camera

Positioning Your Flash

There's a meg and ane ways to position your flash for proper lighting (and I don't know whatever of them), then many times I find myself positioning the flash to face the wall opposite my subject.

Assuming you have white or off-white walls, this bounces the light all throughout the room giving a soft, white lighting effect with minimal shadows.

Again, this is merely one way to position your flash that I'k describing for the purposes of this article – be sure to light your discipline co-ordinate to your creative needs!

Pullback shot of a flash setup - Hot shoe and trigger attached to a hotshoe on the Mamiya RZ67 - How to Use Flash with Film Photography by John Adams III on Shoot It With Film
Wink positioned facing the wall opposite my subject

Understanding Sync Speed

With the flash set, I'll now commencement taking exam shots on my digital camera and adjusting my settings according to how brilliant or dark the image is.

This is when y'all will demand to know the flash sync speed of your picture show camera.

What is sync speed and why do you need to know it? In brusk, when you fire your shutter while utilizing flash, you have to ensure your shutter isn't closing faster than the speed of the wink. Otherwise, you will have a completely bare image or a one-half exposed paradigm where the shutter curtain wasn't completely out of the way when the flash fired.

For many cameras, the highest your shutter speed can go while using flash is one/125. For the Canon AE-ane it is i/threescore, and for some cameras with leaf shutters, such as the Mamiya RB/RZ and Hasselblad 500CM, you lot can shoot at any shutter speed you like.

Before you begin shooting with your film camera, double check the flash sync speed and don't exceed it.

Medium format film image of a portrait of a woman - How to Use Flash with Film Photography by John Adams III on Shoot It With Film

Taking Test Shots

So, let's say I'm taking some soft portraits with my flash.

I'k going to gear up the aperture on my digital camera to f4, as that is the widest I can get on my film camera.

My ISO will be set to 400, because I've got Kodak Portra 400 loaded in my photographic camera.

The final piece is determining the proper shutter speed. The fastest speed the Mamiya RZ67 has is one/400, so I'll dial that in to my digital and get-go there by taking a test shot.

If it is as well vivid, I either need a faster shutter speed (which I can't practice because the RZ67 tops out at 1/400,) a narrower aperture (something I don't want to touch because I want the soft look of f4,) or I can decrease the ability of the flash.

Flash power setting - Hot shoe and trigger attached to a hotshoe on the Mamiya RZ67 - How to Use Flash with Film Photography by John Adams III on Shoot It With Film
Adjusting the power settings on the wink

The Neewer wink I own shows the power as a number between 26 and 90, so determining the best setting is mostly guesswork.

Once a proper exposure is plant, I will make a annotation of my camera settings and be sure non to change the flash'southward power.

In this example, if the original test epitome on the digital were also night, I could burnish the image by slowing my shutter speed down from ane/400, finer letting more lite into the scene.

Medium format black and white film image of a portrait of a woman - How to Use Flash with Film Photography by John Adams III on Shoot It With Film

Connecting the Flash to Your Film Camera

At present that we've found the camera settings necessary to achieve a proper exposure, we can gear up our film camera with the flash.

In this example, I shot photos of my wife with both the Mamiya RZ67 and the Yashica Mat 124.

Medium format film image of a portrait of a woman - How to Use Flash with Film Photography by John Adams III on Shoot It With Film

Connecting the Flash with a PC Sync Cable

When setting up the flash with the Yashica, I grabbed a standard PC Sync cable, which came included with the Neewer flash triggers I purchased, and plugged one terminate into the flash and the other into the input port on the forepart of the Yashica.

(You can test your wink to meet if information technology's working past plugging in the PC sync cable and firing the shutter prior to really loading movie.)

Once your cable is plugged in, that'due south it! Y'all're officially shooting with flash, information technology'southward that easy.

Dial in the settings that you lot constitute to exist correct with your digital camera, and shoot away.

Sync port on the Yashica Mat 124 - Hot shoe and trigger attached to a hotshoe on the Mamiya RZ67 - How to Use Flash with Film Photography by John Adams III on Shoot It With Film
Sync port and attached sync cable on the Yashica Mat 124

Connecting the Flash Wirelessly

When connecting the flash to the Mamiya RZ67 for these photos, I utilized the wireless triggers, although the PC Sync cable method would accept worked perfectly. The simply difference beingness that the cable input is on the lens and not on the camera trunk itself.

Much like a digital camera, I plug one receiver into the wink, ensure information technology's on the "Wink" function, and slide the other one onto the hot shoe of the photographic camera.

A quick examination shot before you lot load picture show will show you that the flash fires properly.

Hot shoe and trigger attached to a hotshoe on the Mamiya RZ67 - How to Use Flash with Film Photography by John Adams III on Shoot It With Film
Flash trigger attached to the hot shoe on the Mamiya RZ67

That's information technology guys! Taking the fright abroad from working with flash and motion picture tin be very easy with a little assistance from the digital tools at your disposal.

Retrieve, there are no rules to fine art! Utilize the tools at your disposal to requite you the all-time event possible!

Cheers then much, John! John is a regular correspondent here at Shoot It With Film, and you tin can check out his other manufactures here, such as a review for the Mamiya RZ67 and a tutorial for 3D film photography. You can also bank check out more of John's work on his website and Instagram.

If you accept questions about shooting wink with film, go out them below in the comments, and you tin can selection upwardly a Neewer S300N flash unit and Neewer Wireless Flash Triggers on Amazon!

Check out all of our film photography tutorials here.

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Source: https://shootitwithfilm.com/flash-and-film-photography-taking-the-fear-out-of-using-flash-with-film/

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