Forgive me if this is too basic but the Canon article titled Fill Flash Use with Canon EOS Cameras and Speedlites may be of some help. There are more tips and techniques at the Canon Digital Learning Center. And, of course, one of the definitive resources is at the Strobist site titled Lighting 101: Balancing Flash and Ambient.

I hope this helps a bit!

Kenneth / Norwy

I appreciate you sharing your informed perspective on capturing natural expressions and certainly know what you mean. It’s valuable for readers to hear your approach because it may well be the one that serves them best. I try to do what feels best for a particular situation and in this case, given limited time and a video to complete, I held no reservations in asking for the smiles. Yesterday we photographed nine lawyer portraits and each individual was a completely different study in personality and characteristics. I wish we could have had a video camera present to record that particular session, it was both fun and insightful.

And thanks for the message on episode 14, I appreciate you spreading the word on prophotolife.com!

I love the videos and to date I have been very impressed with them and have recommended them to members on the talk photography and photography on the net forums.

Having been a professional social and wedding photographer for a number of years I have had nothing to criticise about your videos and have learnt some useful and exciting tips from your videos on the genres I have little experience of, in fact video number 6 is my favourite to date, but in this video (No 27) I have to make a small exception and to call you to task for your asking your subjects to smile, this may well work if you are used to using professional models, but for the average sitter who has little if any modelling experience it will only result in a forced smile and this can often be unflattering as it can look more like a grimace.

It is much more successful to engage the sitter/s in genuine conversation and then to inject a light hearted feel into the discourse which should offer the most natural and relaxed smiles, this is doubly more important with children.

To be perfectly honest, whilst a smile is nice in a portrait, how important is it really, most famous portraits do not have smiling subjects, and these tend to show strength and character and whilst mummy and daddy may like a shot of their child smiling, they will also love shots taken of them looking at their most natural.

Keep up the good work, and I hope that you manage to see and respond to this message, I left a message earlier on another thread below episode 14, but I suppose this thread is no longer checked for messages.

I’m writing from Bangkok Thailand. I really love your website and gave me the ideas to made a beautiful pics. Thank you for share your knowledges & experiences to new photographer like me.

PS.Hope Thai fans will have chance to meet you in our country.

Cheer

Natthapat W.(Aek)

I’m totally blown away how you freely give of your knowledge, time and experience to help educate us mere mortals further. I’m definitely an ungifted amateur, but I’ve learned an immense amount from your videos, so thanks again and keep it up! Please!

cheers,
Tim