help with strobe position

i've had a tg-6 + video light for while and can achieve decent results with the setup. i recently got a ys-01 strobe and was eagerly looking forward to instantly becoming a legendary underwater photographer but apparently the strobe makes me a legendary failure lol. I can barely get decent shots. i feel like its mostly positioning of the strobe, but i just can't seem to find a sweet spot and dark bakcgrounds for macro seem to have completely eluded me. i started with backscatter's settings and guide, although it was just overexposing everything so i ended up taking it off TTL so i could adjust the power. this seemed to get better results when paired with 'fill in' flash on the TG, but its still not great to be honest.

is this level of frustration normal? and any help about how to make this better?

14 minutes ago, racerx_ said:

is this level of frustration normal? and any help about how to make this better?

Totally normal, Jeremy! (and welceome to Wetpixel)

With a video light you are/were lighting up a whole area. A strobe is more directed. So you are right, it's about positioning.

With one strobe try aiming it to "kiss" the subject with an edge of the light with the strobe above the camera at approx the 10 o'clock position or 2 o'clock. There's a huge element of suck it and see - then suck it again.... It's better if the strobe (strangely) is aimed outward from the subject rather than (intuitively) directly at the subject.

Maybe till you can see what is happening and review your images, I'd suggest taking if off TTL and then you can see the Manual exposure that you get and that you can play with.

If you are looking for macro black background, you need a fast shutter speed - as fast as the camera will sync preferably - whilst your aperture is set for macro (so small). The slower the shutter speed, the less black the background will be as the camera lets in more light.

6 hours ago, racerx_ said:

i've had a tg-6 + video light for while and can achieve decent results with the setup. i recently got a ys-01 strobe and was eagerly looking forward to instantly becoming a legendary underwater photographer but apparently the strobe makes me a legendary failure lol. I can barely get decent shots. i feel like its mostly positioning of the strobe, but i just can't seem to find a sweet spot and dark bakcgrounds for macro seem to have completely eluded me. i started with backscatter's settings and guide, although it was just overexposing everything so i ended up taking it off TTL so i could adjust the power. this seemed to get better results when paired with 'fill in' flash on the TG, but its still not great to be honest.

is this level of frustration normal? and any help about how to make this better?

The TG-6 is not straight forward when it comes to playing with strobes and Backscatters guides have a few misleading points in them.

First you need to recognize that the TG-6 has only two variable apertures  f2 & f2.8 at the wide end and f4.9 & f6.3 at the long end.  It will do f8 and f18 at wide and long but this is achieved by an ND filter.   It will also interpolate as you zoom.

The second problem is that the TG-6 only has Av and program modes and as a result tries to balance ambient and flash lighting.  So you are reduced to tricking it to work the way you want by taking advantage of the minimum shutter speeds in each flash mode.

If you want black backgrounds I would suggest f18, ISO100, Av mode with -2 exposure compensation and manual flash output to trigger your strobe in manual.    You adjust exposure purely by changing the strobe output.  Shutter speed will be quite low but flash should totally overpower any ambient contribution unless you are very shallow in very clear water.

Also note that preventing the strobe lighting things behind you subject is important - if you have more reef only 200-300mm behind your subject that will receive flash light as well quite likely - not all subjects will allow you to get a fully black background.

If you haven't reviewed online resources about strobe positioning, this one is very good:  https://www.opticaloceansales.com/files/OOS-Strobe-Positioning.pdf

hey thanks to both of you for the input on this. part of the issue is figuring out where the light 'kisses' the subject  and being able to mess with it a lot without my subject running away lol. i will keep messing with it! i've got a few more dives this week so we'll see if i can master this.. so far these two are probably the best of the first couple of dives with the strobe. 

Looking pretty decent in those shots, just need to keep practising.

7 hours ago, ChrisRoss said:

Looking pretty decent in those shots, just need to keep practising.

Agreed! They are not too shabby!