D2H/SB800 and tungsten

[Tom_Parkes]

How useful do people find the gels supplied with the SB800 for converting the flash white balance to tungsten or flourescent when used with the D2H?

I’ve been making tests with Nikon’s gels and others made by Lee to find a simple combination suitable for use where some tungsten lighting is present so I can gel the flash, dial in a white balance and shoot without having to make a preset WB.

The gel supplied with the SB800 works well provided I can make a white balance preset but is way off when used with either the incandescent or Kelvin settings on the D2H.

A full CTO gel with the incandescent setting would be the obvious move, but is too cyan.

The nearest combination I have found is a dark amber gel and 2800K set on the camera. It’s up on red but gives a better look than I can find with Nikon’s gel.

Anyone have a better idea how to go about about this?

Tom

[Roger_Loeb]

You pretty clearly understand the problem: you need to balance the flash to the color temp of the existing light, whatever it is. The problem is in the "whatever it is," since the color temp of incandescent light varies all over the place. And, of course, the problem is even worse if you have some amount of sunlight (or shadelight) coming through a window. This is really fun in an area lit with both flourescent and incandescent :-) The gels that come with the SB-800 are a reasonable compromise. The full pack, which costs about $20 U.S., has two shades each of orange and green, giving you slightly more flexibility.

My solution, although perhaps not yours: I have a color temp meter and a collection of gels cut from Rosco sheets. I measure the temp of the ambient light, then select a set of gels to match and add them to the strobe(s). This messes up the flash output, so I then use a flash meter to get the correct exposure. A lot of trouble, and I'll only do it if the shot really needs to be that "perfect." As you undoubtedly know, trying to fix this kind of problem in Photoshop is a real pain...

The other approach, which is sometimes easier, is to light the place with multiple SB-800s and use enough strobe to overpower the ambient light. This is particularly effective when you're doing group shots at a social function. A couple of SB-800s to light the background usually serve the purpose, and still give you some freedom of movement. [I've done this at an event where I and two other photogs placed SB-800s all around the room, so that every shot any of us took lit every wall. The primary flash, mounted on a bracket attached to the camera, provided the lighting for the subject, so all the remote flashes were just for the purpose of making sure the walls, slightly offwhite, weren't orange in the resulting shots. (The room had a reasonable amount of incandescent and a large number of chandeliers; real nuisance to remove those chandeliers from the tops of people's heads in PS.)]

The best of all worlds is to have two assistants, each carrying a tall, lightweight lightstand with an SB-800 mounted on top. For every shot they place the additional lights on either side of, and behind, the subject, facing straight away from the camera.

Rog

[Tom_Parkes]

Thanks Rog,

It seems odd to me that the gels supplied with the flash don't match more closely to the settings available on the camera. I spent an evening in a darkened room trying to dial the camera in to match the TN A1 gel (the orange one) and couldn't get close enough to satisfy me either with the incandescent setting, including the +/- adjustments or the direct Kelvin setting.

I'd like to be able to get a ball park match so that the flash and camera white balance match each other as closely as possible while still not being wildly different from the light in the rest of the room. I'll settle for the flash being the main source of illumination for the subject rather than trying to balance the room lighting exactly. With film, I used to gel the flash with a full CTO and use an 80A on the lens, and bingo!

I'll explore the full Nikon filter pack option.

Thanks for your help.

Tom