FYI
“To illustrate this point, let's look at the rate of light fall off for the SB-24/ 25/26 (which are all the same). Using film with an ISO of 125, a subject at 60 feet can be properly exposed at f/2.8. At f/4 it drops to 40 feet, f/5.6 to 30 feet, f/8 to 20 feet, f/11 to 15 feet, f/16 to 10 feet and at f/22 to a mere 7feet. That's an incredible drop off in power in the space of a few feet. But it's important and a fact of life we must work with. (This assumes the subject is an 18% gray and does not take into account whether the subject is white or black because either case can radically change the needed f/stop.)
You should also note from this point the relationship between flash-to-subject distance and aperture. Aperture is our other means of regulating the exposure. Using the information in the above example, if the subject is 30 feet away the proper exposure is f/5.6. But if our subject is white and at that same distance, we would probably want to open the aperture up to f/4 to record the subject as white. And if the subject is dark, we would want to probably close up one stop to f/8. During this whole exercise, the flash-to-subject distance never changed. We changed exposure strictly by changing the f/stop.”