Confused lighting

[Andybazyoung]

Help!!
I was asked to take photographs at an indoor climbing competition at my local climbing wall. I presented myself in plenty of time to get set up and check the lighting for different shots. All was going well until they turned the main lights out & turned on the strobe, spot and luminescent lighting. At one end of the barn was enough light to use Av and some M shots but at the other end, separated by a huge man made boulder, darkness! here the only thing I think of doing at that stage was use a flash which brightened everything up & I lost some of the atmosphere. Any help on what I should have done will be gratefully received.

[Andrew76]

Hi Andy.

What 'atmosphere' were you looking to achieve?

A flash would certainly brighten everything up, and so if you are trying to get the climbers in their natural ambient darkness, that would not work.

If you choose not to use flash, then you're only real option is a tripod, and slow shutter in M I'm afraid.

I shoot Roller Derby on occasion, (albeit not well), and face similar issues. I however, use remote flashes with big diffusers and find that it still keeps the dingy kind of arena mood.

[Andybazyoung]

Hi Andrew, The comp was a fun night but with serious climbing. I am a climber myself, or should say 'has been' so could understand what was happening. Tripod was out of the question as there are crash mats all over so my footing was not brilliant anyway &when someone walked past I was moving loads so am quite pleased with some of the results. I am having difficulty loading my pics so you cannot see what I mean. Thanks anyway for your observations.

[AB26]

Hi Andy,

Have you tried using flash and setting the Aperture manually to control the atmosphere? (Camera set to M) If the flash is set to F5.6 try F7 on the camera and see the difference.