Photo tips camera settings, using flash

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FLASH YES/NO

Without any doubt, the worst, most horrible, ugliest way to light any subject is with the little flashgun that now comes built into every camera. The problem is, a full strength flash tends to blow out the foreground with a big burst of light. This helps you see the smiling subjects well, provided that they are close enough, but the background is left completely dark.

Learn to use flash is a difficult case. If you do not want to spend hours/days/weeks (years?) to exercise, try to avoid using flash - or you need to accept that the feeling is gone. This means unfortunately, that you cannot take pictures in some circumstances. If you do use flash, use always red-eye correction.

If your camera indicates that 'here must be flashed' (most models do so well), and no people are present in your scene, do it NO WAY! Set a low ISO value and use a tripod or other stable surface and let you camera doing its thing: choosing a lower shutter speed. This is the same method how you can photograph evening themes.

Sometimes you cannot escape and you will use flash. It is important to know first, that most camera flashes too hard. If you can adjust the strongness of the flash (less than full power) you can get better results. How you can do this? Basically, the camera sensor needs more light sources than only the flash:

Do all possible lights on
Change the ISO value to 200 or 400
Set the white balance correctly

It seems to be cheerless with all lights on, but do you want to take usable photos or not? 10 minutes lights on during the party is not a disaster.
The value of ISO 200 or 400 is safe to minimize noise. If your camera can handle it, and the image would be acceptable, use a higher value.
The white balance is very important. Flash light is very flat. If you do not have 'flash' white balance setting, you can also use the setting that results the most red-orange colours (control your LCD screen). The best solution is to adjust the white balance manually.

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