Light! (11)
If backlighting is what happens when your subject is lit from behind while you expose for their face, then silhouettes are what happen when a subject is lit mostly from behind and you expose for the light.
Silhouettes are created in extreme lighting situations when the light behind your subject is bright and the light on and in front of your subject is low. When you expose for the bright background, you render your foreground and suject to be darker, giving you a silhouette. It's a great storytelling trick that puts just the form or the "idea" of your subject completely in context with it's background. Just look at this story told at the beach near sunset...
When using a point and shoot camera or shooting in automatic, turn off your flash and the camera will do the work for you - automatically exposing for the brightest part of the image (the backlight). When shooting in manual, spot meter for the background (the brightest light) by pointing your camera at the backlight and get your settings from there!
One of the best things about Silhouettes? They're easy to accomplish with just a little bit of trial and error and they go a long way to help you understand how your camera handles exposure. Artsy and informative - what's not to love?!?
It's one of those things. You probably nailed it on accident once or twice and had no idea how to do it again. You've certainly seen in some really jaw-dropping photos but you could never put your finger on exactly what was going on. But wow, once you understand how backlighting works you can reap it's benefits and rock it in your own photos!
Backlighting is easy to describe. It's that beautiful light that shines from behind your subject, illuminating them to the point where they quite literally glow! It can truly take your breath away when done well. But it's not always the easiest effect to acheive - it's one of those lighting opportunities you have to be on the lookout for, and then know how to take advantage of it!
Generally, backlighting works when the light behind your subject is far brighter than the light in front of them. Momtographers will likely find when the late afternoon sun is low in the sky, there's plenty of opportunity for backlighting. Just position your tot facing away from the sun (look for that glowing rim around their hair!) get infront of them, and snap away. They don't have to be directly between your lens and the sun, in fact, it's better if the sun hits them more at an angle. And you'll have to be on the lookout for lens flare depending on how much light is directly entering your lens. It's a practice that takes, well, practice. But it's an effort that pays off in glorious images.
But once you find your backlighting - you still have to get your camera settings right. This can be tricky in and of itself. Backlighting creates a dynamic lighting situation that can be hard to meter for. Where do you meter? The face? The hair? And what mode do you meter in? Spot? Center? (Yes, yes, we promised simple, but you said you wanted "serious snap" so it's time we start asking some of photography's harder questions).
We suggest starting with spot metering and going off your child's face. You're going to get lots of blown exposure around the hair and in the sky - but that's part of what makes this look work. In fact, you're just going to have to learn to accept that with backlit photos, you will end up with some overexposed, blown out backgrounds. Because unless your cutie is a glowing ball of brightness like your light source, chances are their skin is go ing to be darker than the background. You can try slightly underexposing thier face to maintain more detail in the background area - you can always play with it in post processing to brighten up the face or bring the background down further. This is what we've found works best most of the time. Well, that and learning to live with overexposed, blown-out backgrounds in exchange for an illuminated glowing angel child!
There's one final challenge with a backlit photo... that's getting nice light on the face and a catchlight in the eye! Why? Well, the light's BEHIND them. But, if you have them facing a reflective source like a reflector, a body of water or a bright wall bouncing light at them, well then, voila!
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We love love love window light! There is just something about it! We said it before in Brand Spankin' New - every home has at least one great pocket of light and often times it will be in front of a window, or better yet, a bunch of windows.
Window light is great for many reasons: you are almost guaranteed good catchlights, your light is lightly diffused and usually pretty even, (except for times when the sun is low in the sky shining directly through it), plus you have the added benefit of being indoors, sheltered from the elements - you never have the weather to blame for not getting GREAT pictures of your fam!
The other great thing about finding an awesome window is the predictability! Over time you will be so familiar with the light and how it come through your window, it will take little effort to create magic time and time again in your little "spot".
The key to really using good window light is to have the window behind you or to the side of you and your camera while your subject faces it. Here - sometimes it's just easier to SHOW you...
Adrienne's happy place in her Alabama neighborhood is her kitchen! As we see here, she has the window to her back and sweet Sydney directly facing the light streaming in.
And here is an example of some of that magic that Krista loves to conjure up in her living room! Krista is lucky enough to have a living room that is 3/4 covered in windows (quite the rarity in NYC!). Needless to say, she spends a LOT of time shooting there.
She's actually sitting on her window sill with little Miss Luca directly in front of her, looking up at her.
Oh - here's actually a picture of the window Krista was sitting on... but used differently. This picture is a whole other way to use window light - as a backdrop! But that gets a little more complicated, so we'll save it for another lesson or we'll check it out in our learn by looking section!
Bottom line - consider window light the gift that just keeps giving to your family-documenting journey. Even, beautiful, glowing light that will show your child in the best light!
If every day were a bright cloudy day, the world would be yours for the picture taking. Ah - if only we controlled the weather, right? But since we haven't yet figured out how to cue the clouds, we have to look for "pockets" of good light to optimize our picture taking conditions. Enter your friend, open shade.
Just like it's cousin, the cloudy day, open shade creates conditions favorable to picture taking because it is an evenly-lit soft place. When taking photographs outdoors with all-natural light, your biggest obstacles are hard-cast shadows and extreme brights and darks.
So what is it? Open shade is the place where light and shade meet to create an evenly lit space that is just off of the bright light, but not in it. You find it by looking for the hard line at the edge of the light - and then place your subject TOTALLY IN THE SHADE, but FACING the light.
Think garages, doorways, porches, overhangs, and alleyways. Anywhere a nice solid shaded area comes smack up against a wall of light.
You would never know by looking at this picture that just in front of Chloe was the high noon Las Vegas summer sun! The ottoman that she is laying on is right up to the edge of a cabana opening where she is facing that bright light, but not actually in it. 1/2 a foot back towards the wall and it she would have fallen into the dark. 1/2 a foot forward and it would have been too bright for a good picture! But right at the edge of where the two meet is MAGIC!
What to watch out for -
A common mistake made by beginners and (surprisingly) even some seasoned momtographers is when looking for open shade they go right to that beautifully shady spot under the tree in the backyard. While this may seem like a great idea, unless your shade tree area is very dense, most trees create what is known as dappled light. You know when you look at someone and see cheetah-like spots all over them from the shadows created by light coming through the trees?
Look at the top picture! The baby's got spots! What looked like a nice shady area really wasn't one!
Now look at the spots on the ground all around the stroller - that should have been our first warning. Before you start snapping under the tree - inspect the ground - do you see any of the telltale spots? If not, then go for it. If so, then it's really not true open shade - it's more like broken shade!
Again, your safest bet is to look for true shade next to or under a real stucture. Find that line between light and dark - put your subject i n the shade facing the light and VOILA!
Upside down and backwards....
...if you haven't figured it out by now, that's how most things in photography go. So why wouldn't outdoor lighting be any different? Ask anyone but a photographer, "What kind of day do you think is best for taking your kids out for some awesome picture taking?" and the answer is going to be, "A bright and beautiful blue-skied sunny day!".Well if your name is Annie Liebovitz or if you had an arsenal of equipment, years of experience and invisible sunglasses for your kiddos, that might be the right answer. But since none of the above apply (at least for us!), allow us to introduce you to one of our favorite secret weapons - the bright cloudy day!
We just adore bright cloudy days - they make Momtographers look good! See, an overcast sky is natures diffuser. The clouds capture the harsh bright light of the sun, filtering and spreading it into soft, even lighting that is very flatering - especially when photographing children. It's so flattering that bright overcast days should be written into the schedule as portrait days!
If you remember from our talk on light and exposure, the science of digital photography has to do with how your camera records light to make a picture. All cameras have limitations on how much information they can see and interpret - even the best camera doesn't have near the range of the human eye. For this reason, bright, sunny conditions can be extremely tricky for your camera. Generally, in bright sun, two things happen that work against you:
First, the direct sun is so powerful that it creates huge extremes between light and dark - too extreme for the sensor on your camera to interpret and record. In an effort to properly record one extreme (usually the white), your camera completely loses the other.
The second problem is the harsh shadows cast on whatever the rays of the sun aren't hitting directly making the difference between light and dark even greater. This means unless your children came stock with removable foreheads, their eyes will get lost in the shadow of their brow bone while the sun is overhead. That's if their eyes aren't already totally shut from squinting!
The photo above demonstrates both problems that sunny-day shooting can cause. The first problem is the harsh shadowing cast by the direct unfiltered rays of light coming from above. Because Sydney has her head tilted down, her entire face is covered in shadow, save for a little bit of light reflecting off of her Paw Paw's cap. And Paw Paw, are you even there?
But a BRIGHT overcast day - one with an even covering of light grey clouds that cover the sun - creates light that is soft and even allowing a digital camera to get much more detail from every part of the color spectrum. This ensures that you won't be searching for your little one's eyes in a shadow, or lose too many important details in the dark trying to keep the highlights from blowing out! All you have to do is look for a good background and you're covered.
See this picture of Chloe - she is standing out in the middle of the sidewalk where normally there is no shade and it would be far too bright to get an evenly lit picture. But because it was slightly overcast - Krista was able to effortlessly capture this portrait followed by Chloe's afternoon jumpathon!
Notice how Chloe's face is evenly lit and here eyes are bright and open wide! THANK YOU OVERCAST SKIES!!!
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