Spring 2016  Saber Tails 25    

Petit Basset Griffon Vendéen Club of America

Bernie Indoors in Sunlight

Puppy Susie On Couch

Taffy Snuggling On Top of Susie

W

e don’t have to depend on the sun indoors, we can 

make our light.  Artificial light can be from the light 

fixtures that ordinarily provide light for your indoor activi-

ties, or it can be from a flash, usually a part of the camera 

or mounted on the camera.

I

f I’m going to use flash indoors, I try to use a separate flash 

which either sits on the accessory shoe at the top of the 

camera, or in a flash bracket, and can be tilted so that the 

flash is pointed at the ceiling, spreading out and softening 

the light.  This technique is called bounce flash.  If you use 

the camera’s built in flash, and the lens has a lens shade or 

hood, take that off so that the lens hood does not cut off 

part of the flash, casting a shadow.

G

ood looking flash photography can be a challenge.  

Unless you have a reflector or diffuser accessory over 

the flash or use bounce flash, flash tends to be harsh and 

can cast an annoying shadow behind the subject.

A

lso, a flash that is near to the lens can be reflected from 

the interior of the subject’s eye back to the camera, 

resulting in what is called “red eye” with people or with 

green “pet eye” with animals.  This is generally regarded as 

unattractive.  It can be dealt with in post processing with 

software, but unless you’re post processing your photos, 

that doesn’t help you.  Instead of dealing with pet eye post 

processing it’s better to use a flash farther away from the 

axis of the lens, if possible, or to use bounce flash, which 

is generally more pleasing anyway.  A flash mounted on a 

camera’s accessory shoe may be far enough away from the 

axis of the lens that pet eye can be avoided.  An accessory 

flash often can have the actual flash head pointed toward 

the ceiling or a wall for bouncing. 

P

utting a diffuser accessory over the flash, or a reflector 

accessory around the flash, or bouncing the flash, will 

generally make the exposure more pleasing and even, 

and avoid shadows behind the subject as well as avoid-

ing pet eye, but at the expense of reducing the amount of 

light that is sent to the subject and then reflected from the 

subject to the camera’s sensor.  Increasing the camera’s ISO 

setting can help with that.

I

f your circumstances permit (my house does not lend 

itself to this), you can take action photos of a dog indoors 

using flash. An electronic flash has a very short duration 

which helps stop motion.  So if you have two dogs chasing 

each other from room to room, you can stop them in their 

tracks with a flash.