flash with ambiance

In order to take the above photograph I needed to use a feather's touch of flash to light up the candle holders while also providing enough open shutter to allow for ambient light to come through. So in order to pull that off I shot the image at 1/100th of a second, bounced the flash off the ceiling (with a white card to push a little light forward) dialing the flash strength down a full stop and shooting in aperture mood at f/2.8. It took me a few trial and error shots to get it right.

For more information I really recommend reading the Speedliting blog and website. Particularly his post on Insights for a New Speedliter (pay particular attention to clause number 14!!).