Blurry Fuzz with flash

[bes]

I'm hoping someone may point me in the right direction, I take few pictures and 99% of them are bad... out of focus, out of shot, massively over blown , I'm guessing the usual noobie macro mistakes. On the rare occasion I do get something roughly in focus I sometimes get this fuzzy ghosting happening on the edges.

I use a 1100d with an old pentax 28-70mm lens. I hold the camera in one hand while holding a flash with diffuser in the other. This pic the shutter was 1/128sec and iso400 and maybe f5.6ish fstop. The diffused flash was set to 1/8 power. What is this fuzz and how do I stop it?
bee-fuzz.jpg

[nardes]

The “fuzz” is likely to be the result of camera shake from the natural daylight component of the exposure, whereas the flash component (having a much shorter duration/exposure) will contribute to the sharper details.

Hand holding at 1/128 with one hand on camera whilst holding the flash in the other is the likely culprit in causing the camera shake.

When I use flash in macro photography, I’m usually shooting at 1/250 at F11 which in most instances, “kills” the daylight component leaving just the flash as the main light.

Cheers

Dennis

[bes]

The “fuzz” is likely to be the result of camera shake from the natural daylight component of the exposure, whereas the flash component (having a much shorter duration/exposure) will contribute to the sharper details.

Hand holding at 1/128 with one hand on camera whilst holding the flash in the other is the likely culprit in causing the camera shake.

When I use flash in macro photography, I’m usually shooting at 1/250 at F11 which in most instances, “kills” the daylight component leaving just the flash as the main light.

Cheers

Dennis

Thanks Dennis for the detailed reply which makes sense. My flash syn for this camera is 1/200, but 1/180 is the closest. I have a problem where I can't see what I am shooting on the rear lcd so I have to sometimes lower the shutter.

I have noticed when the on camera flash is up that the screen is always view-able regardless of the manual settings. I will have to experiment.

cheers.
Bes

[ameerat42]

BES. Do you mean (Oh, I agree with Dennis' reply, above.) your LCD screen varies with shutter speed/aperture and is not constant brightness?
How about the optical viewfinder?
Am.

[bes]

BES. Do you mean (Oh, I agree with Dennis' reply, above.) your LCD screen varies with shutter speed/aperture and is not constant brightness?
How about the optical viewfinder?
Am.

The optical viewfinder is brighter Am but I don't think I am fast enough to track a bee and then try and focus and shoot. If I camped and prefocused and was very patient that would be a way better method. I may have to rethink my strategy of chasing bees? Do you good photographers chase or camp while shooting bees?

Like I said above with the built pop up flash up the screen is perfect, this is where perhaps I should've got a ttl trigger and flash instead of the manual ones I bought?

[nardes]

The optical viewfinder is brighter Am but I don't think I am fast enough to track a bee and then try and focus and shoot. If I camped and prefocused and was very patient that would be a way better method. I may have to rethink my strategy of chasing bees? Do you good photographers chase or camp while shooting bees?

Like I said above with the built pop up flash up the screen is perfect, this is where perhaps I should've got a ttl trigger and flash instead of the manual ones I bought?

If your camera has “Live View”, I would check the Live View Menu settings to see if the “Exposure Simulation” is set to "Enable".

This would show a simulated view of the exposure on the Live View LCD, so if the scene is grossly under exposed, the Live View image will appear quite dark or even blank (black).

Turn Off the “Exposure Simulation” and the Live View image should then approximated the daylight conditions.

Cheers

Dennis

[bes]

Thx for the tip Dennis but after much looking through the cameras menus and magic lanterns menus and some googgling I am as someone in the dpreview forums said "SOOL". I have a box on the bottom right hand side of live view sim exp, but to switch that off you need a xD or xxD model the more basic and mine is the most basic model miss out on that feature.

However, while digging around in the Magic Lantern menus I discovered "disable fps" or something that sounds like that, this is supposed to enable live view viewing when the screen is dark. With the lv brightness up and lowering the fps it seemed to be better but was very noisy. I will have to test it.

[bes]

Well I tried looking through the viewfinder and now wonder why was I looking at the rear LCD, ty for the tip a42 While my pics aren't perfect they're definitely a step up when using the viewfinder.

[Kaktus]

oh yes, a definite improvement