iIn this video I'll show you how you can
use the TCM function to get perfect
exposure with flash without needing a
separate meter.
Hello I'm Gavin Hoey and
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Now when it comes to choosing the flashes you
might use in your small home studio,
there is a world of choice out there, and
by and large they are all absolutely
brilliant, however sometimes the flash is
less important than the transmitter,
because this is the thing that you
actually interact with through your
shoot, so I'm using the flashpoint R2 Pro
Transmitter, and in this video,
I'm gonna have a look at one of the
features called TCM, that's short for TTL
flash converted into manual flash, and
the idea with that is simply that you
can get easy metering and consistent
results without the need of a flash meter.
Now before you go and use it, you
have to set it up once, so I'm gonna
press the menu button go right down to
the bottom, and set this up for the 200 J,
because I'm using the eVolve 200 flashes
in this shoot.
So that's the transmitter ready,
let's get a light set, lets get a model in,
let's see how TCM works.
So to help me out today, I've got the amazing Charlotte.
Charlotte's gonna be the model
for this shoot, and the first setup I'm
gonna do, well it's kind of the essential
TCM skill, so I've got my eVolve 200 up
in a softbox,
but it's the transmitter that I'm really
interested in, I'm gonna put it into it's
TTL mode, and that's it, now I'm shooting
in manual mode on my camera, which means
I can choose all of the settings and I
can pretty much dial in anything I want.
So I'll go with my flash sync speed, two
hundred and fiftieth of a second, my
native ISO 200 ISO on my Olympus, your
mileage may vary, and for an aperture
let's go with f/2.8, let's try this okay.
Charlotte let's just take a test shot,
and what I'm looking at is the exposure
on Charlotte, and not surprisingly TTL
flash absolutely nailed it, it looks
perfect once you're happy with the TTL
exposure, all you do - press and hold the
TCM button, and that will convert the TTL settings into
manual settings, and they're locked in so
let's take another test shot see if this
actually worked, here we go, and sure
enough the exposure looks exactly the
same, and that means that from now on the
exposure is locked.
I can do shot after shot after shot, all with
exactly the same lighting, but to really see the
power of this we need to change
something, so I'm gonna change the
background, so what I've done is I've
temporarily swapped to a black
background, because nothing challenges
TTL quite like a really dark background.
So I've still got the manual settings in
the transmitter, let's just take a test
shot and see whether Charlotte remains
the same exposure, I mean she should, this
is manual mode after all,
here we go Charlotte, there
and these may not be the
most exciting background shots,
but as we can see, every picture has exactly the
same exposure, even if i zoom all the way
out, or all the way in, compare that to
the TTL shots, where with TTL some of
them are okay, some of them are a bit
brighter, some of them darker, there's
no consistency, shot after shot and
that's exactly what I would expect TTL to do.
So what happens if you want to run this
with multiple lights, well in effect is
exactly the same.
now remember you've
already set a type of light right at the
beginning, so both of the flashes here
are eVolve 200's, I've got this as
Group A, I've got that as Group B, and
turned off, so group A is on TTL, let's
take a metering shot, work out the
exposure, here we go, if you turn and face
the light brilliant.
Thank You Charlotte, and my test shot,
it looks just a little bit overexposed
for my personal taste, so I'm gonna take
the TTL down one stop, take another test
shot and this time that looks absolutely
lovely, I like that, that looks great
let's lock that in, press and hold the
TCM button, and that converts TTL to
manual okay?
Then we got the hair light
or separation light on Group B, I'll turn
that on to TTL, I'll take a test shot on
that one see how it looks.
Remember the key light isn't going to change,
that's now on manual, but that looks far
too bright as the background light, so
let's take it all the way down to its
lowest TTL exposure compensation, and
that looks great again, when you're happy
press and hold the TCM button to lock
Group B into manua,l and that's it, both
of these lights are now set to manual,
let's take a few shots like this,
Charlotte are you ready, okay let's give
you a prop and here we go
have a look.
So effectively one of the functions of
TCM could be to replace my flash meter,
but the thing is I really like using my
flash meter for a whole bunch of reasons,
so why would I want to use TCM, well
there is one scenario where it is really
helpful, because I can't do high-speed
sync flash with my flash meter, it
doesn't work, but if I switch to TTL, then
switch on high-speed sync, I can dial in
a 1/1,000th of a second as my shutter
speed, and let the TTL do the metering,
let's take a test shot, here we go,
absolutely perfect, so once again we've
nailed the exposure thanks to TTL, no
trial and error it just works,
press and hold the TCM button that locks
that exposure into manual, just go
shooting... are you ready, okay let's take a
few pictures.
If you change the distance between your
model and your flash, then your exposures
gonna change too.
So in this case I redid the TCM process
got a new exposure,
locked in and I'm good to go.
I really like the TCM function, and of
course it's not exclusive to Flashpoint,
other manufacturers have their own
interpretation - for example Profoto, do
something called Auto Exposure Lock
which basically does exactly the same
thing, now whether you use TCM
exclusively or you combine it with a
flash meter, it really doesn't matter,
because these things are just a tool for
a job, and that job is to get your
exposure exactly how you want it.
Now if you've got any questions,
or you've enjoyed this video leave me a comment
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I'm Gavin Hoey thanks for watching.