Photographing with Backlight
Essentially, the main idea of photography is playing with light. If we are able play with light and control how it bounces off the subject, it will of course make for a great photograph. If we made mistakes in lighting, it will surely hurt the result.
The direction of light against the subject of the photo can be directed from several possibilities: front light, backlight, sidelight, top light, and bottom light. Each lighting direction has their own advantages, disadvantages, and level of difficulties while shooting.
This post will concentrate on discussing backlighting, where the source of light is from behind the object of the photograph. Backlight can become a challenge because of the level of difficulty associated with the direction of the light source. The resulting photograph of backlight can be diverse and extraordinary if done well.
Photographing with the backlight technique will prominently separate the object from its background, making the photograph highly dimensional. In addition, other varieties of this technique will result in photographs such as: silhouettes, translucent photos, and rim light (including flares). The results of course will depend on the techniques used by the photographer.
Typically, using this technique will result in silhouette photographs that tend to be under exposed (UE). The backlight photo technique, however, can also create photographs that are not under exposed with applied with additional lighting acting as a fill-in light. Read the rest of this entry » .
