Anyone here ever shot events/seminars?
I'm shooting a seminar-type event tonight set-up as a favor by a friend (to see if it's something I'd like to learn more about in the future and hopefully provide the org some better photos than snapshots). I'm struggling over the best lens to use.
I have a 35mm f/1.8, a 50mm f/1.8 and a super slow (starts at f/4 and goes to f/5.6) 80-200 zoom. I also have an off-camera flash I don't know how to use (I know enough that if I bring it, I should bounce and diffuse it but that's it). Since I shoot a D5100, that makes the lenses 1.5 times longer than their stated length (so, 52.5mm, 75mm, 120-300mm).
Tips and advice would be greatly appreciated.
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And the requisite receptions afterward. The one thing I would recommend has nothing to do with equipment. My recommendation is to get as close to the subject as possible. If that means kneeling in front of the front row, yes. Do it. If it means standing in front of the front row, do it if you can do it like a jack-in-the-box (kneel/stand/shoot/kneel). Shoot from all sides of the "stage" - where ever the presenter is speaking from - to get a variety of angles. Really and truly, I found I could use automatic settings and an indifferent flash unit and get great shots just by being as close as possible to my subject.
If you think this might seem intrusive and obnoxious, just think about watching video of music concerts or live stand-up acts. If you look you see a million camera operators moving all over the stage, but you really only notice them if you look. People are there to see the act (seminar presenter). Also, wear the most neutral, comfortable clothes you own. Black works well. Think of yourself as a stagehand in a minimalist theater production. You have to blend in with the shadows. You will be doing a kind of Jedi mind trick: this camera is not what you are looking at. 
Of course, you'll want to give the speaker(s) a heads-up that you'll be shooting up close and personal. That way they can prepare themselves mentally to not be distracted by you. It makes them a partner in Jedi mind trickery.
Also - this was many years ago, like, 20 - but I don't remember using bounce with that off-camera flash. Seems to me when I did, the shots came out very dark because those halls are usually dark, or have fluorescent lights that make people look green or yellow, and have really high ceilings. I would try using a direct flash. Of you could try mixing up bounce and direct, to cover all bases. Remember, it's not portrait photography, it's more like documentary photography.
without the street and with the knowledge that I'm taking photos instead of sneaking them.
Thanks for the tips, appreciate it.
I don't really know what you mean by off-camera flash. I'm assuming this is just a hot shoe mountable flash which has the capability of being used off camera. Unless you have a flash bracket you can use, I recommend using it on the hotshoe provided you can bounce. I'm assuming it has i-TTL capability, but this may be a poor assumption.
If I had your choice of lenses, I would probably use the 50/1.8 provided you can get fairly close to your subjects (within 10' or so). If you are bouncing the flash, do not use a diffuser (I hate them anyway). Unless you have a 20' ceiling or better, just aim the flash straight up and if your flash lacks a bounce card, just affix a small white piece of paper about the size of a post-it note to the backside of the flash. This will reflect enough light to produce a catchlight in your subjects' eyes. Be careful about using wide aperture settings, especially if you are shooting multiple subjects or you will most certainly have only one of them in focus. I like to shoot aperture priority (which I use for just about everything) and about f/4. At 50mm, f/4 and 8' subject distance, this gives you a little more than a foot of DOF which isn't bad for multiple subjects provided they are roughly the same distance away. If you are shooting at f/1.8, you get less than half the DOF which can make nailing the focus tricky in the types of situations you'll encounter. f/5.6 will give you 21" of DOF @ 8' subject distance and is even more forgiving.
As far as exposure settings go, I'm not sure what capabilities your speedlight has. You should be OK if you use auto-ISO and aperture priority. Basically what you want is the ambient light (without the flash) to be about 2-3 stops down from what your flash provides. This allows the ambient light to fill and keeps your subjects from looking well lit in a sea of blackness. It also keeps you from prematurely draining your flash batteries and decreases recycle times. With an i-TTL capable flash, Nikon will take care of you reasonably well in this regard. Here's how I adjust auto ISO. Remove the flash from the camera. Put the camera in full manual exposure mode. Set your aperture to what you think you'll be using the most. For the 50mm lens, I would set the shutter speed to 1/80 or so for this situation. Take a few test shots and adjust your ISO until the histogram shows about 3 stops underexposed. Now set your auto-ISO maximum sensitivity to this value with a minimum shutter speed of 1/80. Set the camera to auto-ISO, aperture priority, and put the flash back on. Make sure you take extra batteries for the flash.
