Backlit Beauties

Backlit photos are special and magical, but how do you create them? Well, I would like to share with you how I create backlit images.

First off is positioning your subject, be it a person, animal, or object, with their back to the sun and their face in full shadow. Ideally you want your subject between you and your light source, usually the sun. If you can see the sun in your lens, there is a high chance that you will have a sun flare or two in your image and sometimes those fall on your model’s face. Sun flares can make it more artsy, but it’s good to know how to avoid sun flares and how to achieve them on purpose.

One of the most important things is to always remember to expose for your subject, just forget about the background. When you’re photographing a person, make sure to shoot for their skin tone of their face (or lightest color, especially if it’s white). You don’t want your subject to become grainy in post processing because you exposed for the background. It’s okay if the background is overexposed, because it will help bring the focus to your subject.

But how do you know if you’ve properly exposed for your subject? This is when your utilize the light meter, which you can see as you look through the viewfinder usually located along the bottom plane. Also, check to make sure your metering mode is on spot, which will help pinpoint the metering of a certain point.

As always, practice and don’t be discouraged if there’s more mistakes than successes. Everything takes time, but the more time you make to practice, the better you will improve.

Here are a couple backlit beauties that I captured during Golden Hour. You will notice that the sun is just out of frame in the upper left corner and the couple is in the sun, but directly in between me and my light source. The background is over exposed, but my models look wonderful, soft, and happy. I used my Canon 85mm 1.8 lens with settings f/2.2, 1/400, ISO 200.