Improve your portrait photos with flash lighting techniques.
The uses of the flash option on cameras are often underestimated by many amateur photographers. The flash feature is capable of much more than simply providing sufficient lighting in photos. Flash can be used to highlight certain subjects, create shadowless images and create ambient lighting effects. Learning a few of these techniques will assist the beginning photographer in developing their photo-taking ability as well as increase their knowledge and utilization of their camera's flash feature.
Highlighting
If you're looking for an effect that will bring out or highlight a specific subject, whether human or a still object, the flash highlighting technique may be the perfect trick for you. This works best on an overcast day, because sunny days have so much natural lighting already. Choose a subject that is brightly colored or has brightly colored aspects. This can be something as simple as a colorful bracelet on a person to as complex as a beautiful nature photo. Simply aim your camera and take the photo with flash. The regular-colored objects will appear fairly "dull" whereas the bright object(s) will be given definition and a highlighted effect.
Ambient
If you're taking a picture of multiple objects you can use your flash to make a particular object stand out from the others by dimming the light in the room and pointing your flash directly at the focal object. This creates an ambient, soft and glowing look and looks excellent when used in portrait photography.
Shadowless Images
Perfect for portrait or fashion photography, this effect lets you produce a shadowless or a halo image if shooting from behind the light. This is relatively inexpensive and easy to achieve. You'll want to fashion what is called a ring light to your camera lens for a shadowless image. This can be done by binding two or more pocket flashes with rubber bands or string to the lens.
Lighting Specular Objects
Specular objects are objects that are shiny (cell phones, GPS, game systems) and difficult to light without getting a messy glare. You can use Plexiglas to create an evenly lit surface, this will allow you to reflect the light from the Plexiglas to illuminate the object. The light will then bounce off the object and make it look as though the lighting is natural.
Flash Filters
A flash filter is a medium either clipped on or held over the flash mechanism of a camera. Translucent and semi-translucent materials such as coffee filters, baking paper and white t-shirts can be used to give photos a soft white glow. Look into purchasing (or even making) gel filters in varying colors if you want to experiment with different glow shades. Flash filters are fun to experiment with, as virtually any semi-translucent materials can be used.
Tags: brightly colored, experiment with, flash feature, semi-translucent materials, with flash, your camera, your flash
