Akaroa Lighthouse.

There is no off camera lighting in this image unless of course you count the setting sun at rear camera left.
Akaroa is located on the Banks Peninsula just 80kms from Christchurch. The Banks Peninsula was formed following the violent eruptions of two volcanoes. A crater nurses the picturesque harbour of Akaroa with many smaller bays indenting the spectacular coastline. First sighted by Captain Cook in 1770, the Peninsula was then inhabited by Maoris of the Ngai Tahu tribe.
In 1840, French settlers arrived at Akaroa, which had just been claimed under the Treaty of Waitangi by the English. To this day, Akaroa remains unique as the site of the only attempted settlement by the French in New Zealand. Many streets have French names, and there are descendants of the original French families still living in Akaroa.
The original Akaroa lighthouse started operation on the precipitous headland of Akaroa Heads on 1 January 1880. One hundred years later, it was moved down to Akaroa Township, after being replaced in 1977 by an automated light. You can read it's full story here.
http://www.doc.govt.nz/templates/page.aspx?id=34194

Marae.

In New Zealand Māori society, the marae is a place where the culture can be celebrated, where the Māori language can be spoken, where intertribal obligations can be met, where customs can be explored and debated, where family occasions such as weddings and birthdays can be held, and where important ceremonies, such as welcoming visitors or farewelling the dead (tangihanga), can be performed. Like the related institutions of old Polynesia, the marae is a 'sacred place' which carries great cultural meaning.
In Māori usage, marae is technically the enclosed space in front of a wharenui or meeting house (literally "big house"). However, it is generally used to refer to the whole complex, including the buildings and the open space. The meeting house is the locale for important meetings, sleepovers, and craft and other cultural activities. The Marae can have special occasions such as weddings and funerals held in it, a Marae can also differ in size with some being a bit bigger than a double garage and some being as big a a town hall or bigger.
This image is taken inside the meeting house of the marae in New Zealand's national museum 'Te Papa' in Wellington. An SB800 speedlight was placed in the background left to light the rear. The on camera flash is used to trigger this speedlight as well as providing some fill to the mask in the foreground. This shot was taken at 1/60th second, f/7.1, ISO1600. having just checked those numbers I was surprised to see that it was ISO1600. This is a testament to the useability of ISO 1600 on a D80. It was really quite dark inside the meeting house and I think I scared the wits out of some Japanese tourists when the remote flash triggered.

Up A Tree

Strong sunlight was the order of the day in Wellington's Botanic Gardens. The sun is providing a backlight and Chris is being lit by a bare off camera SB800 to the camera left. Settings are ISO200, 1/60th second, f/8. The flash is being triggered by the on camera pop up in commander mode. The purpose of the trip to New Zealand's capital was to see David Beckham play football for the LA Galaxy against the Wellington Phoenix. Chris was fortunate to meet him at the airport and get a football autographed by Beckham.

Black and White

This image was the result of having a quick go at the Strobist 'Film Noir' assignment. I had also quickly made a DIY cereal box snoot for the job. The shot was taken with an SB800 at camera left on 1/128th power, camera settings were 1/200th second, f8, ISO 100. The ambient light was very low. I need to experiment a bit more with some different light modifiers.
The black and white conversion was done in Photoshop with the Channel Mixer palette. All you need to do is tick the monochrome check box and then play with the red, blue and green sliders. The accepted wisdom seems to be that keeping the total of the values for these colours at 100 achieves best results.

Crosslight in Full Sun

This aim of this exercise is to use flash balanced with ambient light to create an interesting image in a situation when the light is essentially awful for 'available light' photography. The process I used was as follows. Set the camera to manual with shutter speed on the maximum sync speed. Set an aperture of around f8 and set ISO to 100 or 200. Take a test shot and chimp the histogram. Adjust the aperture to achieve the background effect you want, make it really dark if you want, there is no correct exposure. Position the subject with the sun over his shoulder at 45 degrees. Set up your flash directly opposite the sun. Maybe half power. Try it out. Adjust flash power or flash distance to suit.

Twilight Balance

The idea of this exercise from Strobist is to practice controlling the ambient versus flash component of an image. Twilight or dawn are the best times to do this as you do not require huge flash power to achieve a result in the face of strong sunlight. The potential backgrounds available can also be more interesting with sunset or sunrise colours. There are plenty of people out there who still advise the use of a meter to achieve the sought after balance between flash and ambient. I currently like the cheaper iterative approach made available by digital cameras and their LCD screens.

So, this is the process I use. Set the camera to manual mode, shutter speed at the maximum sync speed, 1/200th in my case. Estimate an aperture, maybe f5.6, I'm normally starting with ISO200 too. Take a shot of the proposed background, chimp the result and it's histogram. Adjust the aperture if required and chimp again. Persuade my ever willing six year old that it won't take that long really darling (chocolate works well here!). Set my SB800 to remote, dial in manual flash at say 1/8th power in my camera menu. Take a shot. Chimp it. Adjust flash power if necessary. OK, the background will be getting darker so either enjoy this change or slow the shutter to compensate. This will not affect flash exposure. If it is necessary to open the aperture by a stop then the flash power will need to be reduced by a stop too. So far I have only been trying to do this in the garden. The next step is to jump in the car and go up the hill a bit for a better backdrop, we're lucky to be in sight of the New Zealand alps. That may incur a higher chocolate cost for the model.

Heading the Ball (Auto FP)

The other day I decided to experiment with Nikon's Auto FP high speed flash sync. This system allows you to exceed the camera's normal flash sync speed. This can be very useful in the case of fast action requiring flash.
This shot is no masterpiece but it includes action and the nightmare lighting conditions of mottled afternoon sun. I wanted to see if I could stop the action and provide some fill flash. This was taken at 1/500th sec, f5.6, ISO200. The camera was in manual and the flash was on the camera and set for TTL. This means you can set the ambient exposure with a test shot with no flash then turn on the flash and let the TTL system have a go at exposing the subject correctly. Over at http://www.strobist.com/ they would be frowning on this as they advocate manual flash wherever possible. Actually I have experimented with manual flash with Auto FP and it works but you have to be a little bit careful as you move from below to above the normal maximum sync speed of your camera. Why?
First, we should look at why Auto FP is needed? Without a system like Auto FP, trying to take a shot above your camera's sync speed could result in a partially dark frame. In other words a nice photo of part of the back of your shutter. This is because at high shutter speeds there is effectively a slit moving across the film or sensor. Flash at full power is only on for about 1/1000th second, this means that you get a burst of light at some point during the time it takes the slit (shutter) to move across the frame. The maximum sync speed of your camera is therefore the fastest shutter speed at which the entire film frame or sensor is exposed at the same time. The flash must occur at this time. Enter Auto FP!!
Auto FP is a system whereby the camera instructs the flash to remain on for the time it takes for the shutter slit moves across the frame. It appears to work rather well. There is of course a downside, isn't there always! The range, or effective power of the flash is reduced by about two stops.
This is why I have found it slightly tricky when moving over the maximum sync shutter speed with the flash in manual. All of a sudden I have to bump the flash power by a couple of stops for the correct subject exposure.
Having said all of the above, the system seems to be very useful even if it is never a replacement for a faster maximum flash sync speed. I intend to experiment more with this in the near future.