White balance setting and RAW. Also flash sync speed.

[jdramirez]

I'm going to be taking many photos of girls basketball in the upcoming months using a 60D, 100mm f/2.8L IS USM, 50mm f/1.4, and maybe a 5dmkii and a 24-105mm f/4L IS if I can find a deal.  There is blue padding along the walls of the gym that I plan on bouncing light from a 430ex ii out onto the court.  So one of my question is... if I'm bouncing light which gives a definite blu-ish tint, do I have to adjust the white balance to combat that?  I suppose I'm thinking that adjusting the white balance would only affect the .jpg image and not the raw image which I will later process in Lightroom.  So am I full of crap? 

Also, the 9 year old girls don't move that fast, so there isn't a ton of motion blur with a shutter speed of 1/250 of a second, but I'd prefer 1/1000 so I can freeze the "action".  And if I kick the iso up to 400, I think I can easily achieve 1/1000.  But using flash, I think it prevents me from using shutter speeds faster than 1/250.  I think I'm being redundant, but I can manually adjust in the settings so I can get a faster sync with the 430ex ii on the hotshoe of my 60D?

Thanks a ton...

[Steven_urwin]

I'm going to be taking many photos of girls basketball in the upcoming months using a 60D, 100mm f/2.8L IS USM, 50mm f/1.4, and maybe a 5dmkii and a 24-105mm f/4L IS if I can find a deal.  There is blue padding along the walls of the gym that I plan on bouncing light from a 430ex ii out onto the court.  So one of my question is... if I'm bouncing light which gives a definite blu-ish tint, do I have to adjust the white balance to combat that?  I suppose I'm thinking that adjusting the white balance would only affect the .jpg image and not the raw image which I will later process in Lightroom.  So am I full of crap? 

Also, the 9 year old girls don't move that fast, so there isn't a ton of motion blur with a shutter speed of 1/250 of a second, but I'd prefer 1/1000 so I can freeze the "action".  And if I kick the iso up to 400, I think I can easily achieve 1/1000.  But using flash, I think it prevents me from using shutter speeds faster than 1/250.  I think I'm being redundant, but I can manually adjust in the settings so I can get a faster sync with the 430ex ii on the hotshoe of my 60D?

Thanks a ton...

Hi Jdramirez,

You will pick up that blue-ish tint if you reflect your flash off it (known as colour cast). You can just correct this, very easily in post, but if set your white balance correctly, you will save yourself sometime by not having to do it in post. The other thing that I would be a little wary about is mixing you light colours. If you are shooting in a sports hall, the ambient light is likely to have that horrible yellow tint that all sports hall seem to have (from the fluorescent lights they use)... polluting this, with a blue cast could end up giving you a complete headache.
If you crank up the shutter speed, past 1/200th of a second, and open up the aperture, this will cut down the ambiently light, and bring out the added flash light. Also in doing this, you will be able to 'freeze the action' as you wanted.
With the 430exii, you have the option to turn on HSS. This is your High Sync Speed setting, allowing the camera and flash to sync above the 1/200th of a second. I'm not going to go into how that works, but it does... The trade off (there is always one) is that this results in a lower full power flash, and kills the batteries a little quicker. Action photographers often bank multiple flashes together to get more power in HSS and improve the recycle times of the flashes, so they can do multiple frames per second. Obviously this is reliant of owning more than one flash, and a way to trigger them all together. Que the 600EX-RT.
Please, anyone feel free to correct me if any of what I have said is wrong, I'm not a complete strobist guru...yet

[bkorcel]

With the 430 and HSS you should be able to bounce off the gym roof instead of the walls.  Obviously it will require more output and so your recycle time will take longer and your batteries will not last as long.  However when I shot basketball years ago you dont use drive mode too much...more about waiting for the shot and taking one.

I would avoid bouncing off the blue mats.  That's going to be a major headache and with the LPS or FL lighting it would go to deep yellow or orange if you corrected to remove the blue cast.

I'm going to be taking many photos of girls basketball in the upcoming months using a 60D, 100mm f/2.8L IS USM, 50mm f/1.4, and maybe a 5dmkii and a 24-105mm f/4L IS if I can find a deal.  There is blue padding along the walls of the gym that I plan on bouncing light from a 430ex ii out onto the court.  So one of my question is... if I'm bouncing light which gives a definite blu-ish tint, do I have to adjust the white balance to combat that?  I suppose I'm thinking that adjusting the white balance would only affect the .jpg image and not the raw image which I will later process in Lightroom.  So am I full of crap? 

Also, the 9 year old girls don't move that fast, so there isn't a ton of motion blur with a shutter speed of 1/250 of a second, but I'd prefer 1/1000 so I can freeze the "action".  And if I kick the iso up to 400, I think I can easily achieve 1/1000.  But using flash, I think it prevents me from using shutter speeds faster than 1/250.  I think I'm being redundant, but I can manually adjust in the settings so I can get a faster sync with the 430ex ii on the hotshoe of my 60D?

Thanks a ton...

[Dylan777]

I'm not an expert in flash, no advice on flash.

I did owned both 60D & 5D II in the past, none of these cameras will do well with fast or sport shooting.

7D or 5D III + 135L would be my choice - without flash.

[jdramirez]

I'm not an expert in flash, no advice on flash.

I did owned both 60D & 5D II in the past, none of these cameras will do well with fast or sport shooting.

7D or 5D III + 135L would be my choice - without flash.

Why do people love their 7D so much?  It does have a faster shots per second and micro auto focus adjustment... and outside of that I really don't know that I would want an upgrade to the 7D.  And for everyone who says they love the 7D and the focal points and the auto focus... I hear the same amount of people saying it is wonky and doesn't always work right. 

And if I'm using flash... it doesn't matter what my frames per second are.  I can only take one photo every few seconds.  So I have to make the first one work.

As for the 135... I will not complain about the lens at all, save for the fact that I don't have one yet.  I'm looking at getting one around Christmas, but I have to wait and see and hope and pray.  Having said that, I think the 100mm gets me a little too close to the action.  Another 35mm x 1.6 conversion factor doesn't seem like it would help me that much.  But I definitely wouldn't mind that extra stop of light and shallower depth of field.

As for the 5d mkiii.  Yeah... duh.  But obviously I don't have the scratch right now to buy it.  There aren't enough pennies underneath my couch cushions to swing that deal. 

[jdramirez]

With the 430 and HSS you should be able to bounce off the gym roof instead of the walls.  Obviously it will require more output and so your recycle time will take longer and your batteries will not last as long.  However when I shot basketball years ago you dont use drive mode too much...more about waiting for the shot and taking one.

I would avoid bouncing off the blue mats.  That's going to be a major headache and with the LPS or FL lighting it would go to deep yellow or orange if you corrected to remove the blue cast.

I need to learn how to use HSS.  I know I have cycled through that feature, but I haven't used it.  I have had the flash for only three months... so I have some excuse...?

The ceiling of the gym is about 30 feet high... which seems like an awful distance to bounce light.  The good news is that it is painted white.  I was thinking about putting an opaque white plastic bag over the head of the flash and using that as a diffuser.  Real classy, I know.  I'll give that a try the next time I go and hit up practice... though I have to find just the right bag... not too opaque.... not too flimsy.

As for the batteries, I can switch out a set at half time...  I have rechargeable ones... and while they aren't the sanyo eneloops... they do the trick.

Ditto on the drive.  I took some shots without flash and at f/2.8 I wasn't getting the shot I want.  So it will be one shot per.  I look forward to that though.  It takes more skill than spray and pray.  Though it is a Catholic school... so if there is a time to pray.

I appreciate the help guys.

[jdramirez]

So I spent the day learning about high sync shutter and it is really cool.  I know I will easily be able to shoot at 1/2000th of a second using the 430ex ii and my 60d, but I'm not 100% sure what I will do with the bouncing of the light.  I think what I am going to do is make a home made diffuser to mount over the speedlight so I have the light, but it is not as powerful. 

Fingers crossed.

[rpt]

So I spent the day learning about high sync shutter and it is really cool.  I know I will easily be able to shoot at 1/2000th of a second using the 430ex ii and my 60d, but I'm not 100% sure what I will do with the bouncing of the light.  I think what I am going to do is make a home made diffuser to mount over the speedlight so I have the light, but it is not as powerful. 

Fingers crossed.

Home made diffuser? Simple! A translucent white plastic bag and a rubber-band! That it! And the best part is that your diffuser height and even the shape is variable

[Marsu42]

So I spent the day learning about high sync shutter and it is really cool.  I know I will easily be able to shoot at 1/2000th of a second using the 430ex ii and my 60d, but I'm not 100% sure what I will do with the bouncing of the light.  I think what I am going to do is make a home made diffuser to mount over the speedlight so I have the light, but it is not as powerful. 

I found that the hss+430ex2 is not powerful enough to do large bounces or mount a diffusor with the object not near the camera, and if it is and somehow manages the flash power is drained in one shot and it needs a lot of time to recycle. But feel free to try and tell me otherwise :-)

[sanj]

I would attempt to put an appropriate orange gel on the flash to correct the blue and not leave this for post. Or, take a largish piece of white cardboard and blue tack it on the wall and bounce the flash off it.
If u leave it for post and correct the blue tint then the ambient light will take a beating.
Please check again, maybe your camera/flash will sync to higher shutter speeds, my 5d3/older flash does. You need to set correct settings in the flash. And yes faster shutter speed is a good idea. Pump up the iso if need be as much as required but you must freeze.
Wish you a great shoot.

[Pyrenees]

I would try to avoid, if at all possible, reflecting off anything that isn't in the realm of a neutral color, let alone blue. It has the potential to be very difficult to correct, as eluded to above.

The suggestion above to stick a white paper/board and reflect off that seems like a good idea. Or, if you have one, place a white reflector (triangle or circular) against the wall. There is also the option of using the built-in reflector card (if your flash has it), although, I suspect this will be the least effective option.

Good luck with the shoot.

[risc32]

don't even think of bouncing off a gym ceiling with a shoe mounted flash. that's just not going to do anything but drain your batteries. and,,.. i gotta go my 3yr old needs me, i'll check back in a bit to see if you got any good advise...

[Enthusiast]

Hi Jdramirez,
The HSS is no the right answer to your problem! HSS is using the flash as a lamp, glowing 1/200s to keep the light on as long as the shutter is running. (Shutter sync speed). To prevent the flash to be demaged, the Hss flash is 4 times weaker than the normal one. HSS is only made to fill shadows while shooting portrait outside in the sun with wide open aperture and high shutter speed.
The normal flash is just 1/800s so the flash is delivering you the freeze and the higher power you need in a gym.
To keep the white balance under control, I would use a lee filter in front of the flash. These filters are realy cheap. You can buy a sample package from Lee with 100 different colors for 15$.
How to make it work: 
1.Take your camera and make some shots in the gym with automatic WB.
2. Look with the info page on the WB.
3. Chose a filter for the flash with the same K and stick them in front of the flash.
4. Fix the WB manually to the same value.
5. Use Av mode and correct -2EV and flash correction to 0EV: the flash is than 75% and the room light is 25% of total that gives you a good freeze and non overflashed look. If you struggle with to short shutter speed, switch tomanual mode and 1/250s the E-TTL will put the right flash in.

Advantages:
Only one color of light - easy to adjust in the post
Enough flash power
If the flash is not using ful power, shorter repeat time

Same strategy also works for parties with a 3200k filter in front of a flash and normal lights. You can handhold and freeze with 300mm easily.

Would be nice to get a feedback if this works for you.

Enthusiast

[Marsu42]

the Hss flash is 4 times weaker than the normal one.

Just curious: Where do you get the "4 times" number from?

And I suppose it's 4 times of the max. flash output, and you really only need that with diffusors or bouncing from the moon - imho esp. with a larger flash like the 580ex-types hss works quite well for most purposes, the real downside is that it cannot freeze motion which is an issue because the x-sync speeds of Canon are so slow,

[Mt Spokane Photography]

The standard sync speed for a flash will probably work well for what you describe as slow moving subjects.  Don't make things more difficult than they need be.  I'd try several different methods, thats how you learn.
I'd think, however, that bouncing flash off the blue mats will result in a mixed color, which is difficult or impossible to totally correct without extreme editing.
I'd also be wary of the lights in the gymn.  Often the lights they use flicker at the line frequency, or they cause color issues.  This means you will need the full power from your flash to overcome this.
The only way to tell is to try different things and see what works best for you.  Things that work best for others may not work for you due to the different lighting in your gymn.
BTW, use manual or TV, don't play with AV in your situation.  The 5D MK II will be fine, just use the center point.  You are not going to use the AF points to track movement anyway.