Night shots without killing subject with the flash?

[HT]

So yeah, taking pictures in a relatively dark parking lot sucks. I was at a car meet last night and took a few pictures with my 50 1.8. The tripod supported pictures turned out pretty good. Handheld just plain sucked (depending on where I was).
As soon as I come back from my vacation I'm definitely getting a flash. Is there a technique/way to use direct flash without killing the subject?
Am I safe to say "use a diffuser" of some sort? What do you guys recommend?

[Jake]

Originally Posted by HT

So yeah, taking pictures in a relatively dark parking lot sucks. I was at a car meet last night and took a few pictures with my 50 1.8. The tripod supported pictures turned out pretty good. Handheld just plain sucked (depending on where I was).
As soon as I come back from my vacation I'm definitely getting a flash. Is there a technique/way to use direct flash without killing the subject?
Am I safe to say "use a diffuser" of some sort? What do you guys recommend?

Getting the flash off camera will help. You can put the flash on a tripod, or you can say "hey buddy, hold this and point it over there" and get someone to hold it.
Rear certain sync and dragging the shutter has a cool look also.
Some times a good old flash light works great too.

But I think the tripod is still a good idea.

[kenw]

a diffuser or bounce it off the ceiling (if there is one). or use flash compensation and dial it down.

[HotHolly]

You should be able to dial down your flash (or up if ever needed) by changing some of the settings on your camera. You can get a hot shoe cable that will allow you to move the flash off your camera, use a bracket, or hold it.

[DEMDeepEllumMusic]

grab a couple used flashes that have optical triggers built in-then dial down the flash on your camera to just trigger the other units and then place them in whatever manner that you wish. So you can push up say one flash to a high # to say light up behind/inside the car for an effect (just be sure that you can trigger the unit) and then one or more around the perimiter to add in fill as needed.

(there are a number of flashes that have built in optical triggers, some are very cheap used, while others are more expensive and with these you are not limited to where you can set up since you are on batteries).