Tuesday, July 1, 2008


FIX YOUR PIX--

Obey the laws of physics...

...one of which says, “Light diminishes inversely with the square of the distance over which it travels.” In non-scientific jargon that means light gets dimmer the farther it travels from its source.

That phenomenon is clearly evident in the above photo which was done as a demonstration at the local library. You also see this in your car headlights at night. Absent some reflecting surface your headlights quickly fade to darkness in the distance ahead.

Naturally, this applies to that tiny flash built into your camera.

It is only effective from approximately 5 feet to 10 feet from your camera. If you shoot closer than 5 feet your subject likely will be much too bright. If you are shooting a subject more than 10 feet from the camera with the flash your subject will be too dark.

Very bright existing light or back-lit subjects cause different things to happen. And, a very sophisticated camera may adjust the flash output automatically to cover a wide range of subject distances.

But, under normal, fairly dark conditions with a typical film or digital camera keep your subjects between that 5 and 10 foot range and you will have nicely exposed, flash-lit photos.

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