DIY Photography

Hacking Photography - one Picture at a time

  • News
  • Inspiration
  • Reviews
  • Tutorials
  • DIY
  • Gear
Search

Submit A Story

Four ways to make the best of direct sunlight in your portraits

Jun 8, 2018 by Dunja Djudjic Leave a Comment

  • Share
  • Tweet
  • Flipboard
  • WhatsApp

Even though harsh midday sun is far from an ideal lighting situation, sometimes you’ll have no other choice. In this video, Jay P. Morgan shows you four ways to make the best of that direct sunlight and turn it into your advantage. He demonstrates three setups that only use the sunlight, and the fourth one adds a strobe to the equation. But in all cases, you’ll end up with great portraits even in the otherwise unflattering direct sunlight.

When you’re in the harsh sunlight, one of the solutions is to go and find shade. But, this means that you need to change location. And if you like the location you’re at – here are the ways to use the direct sunlight to your advantage.

1. Use sunlight as the key light

This will give you a harsh, dramatic light. You can tone it down by using a reflector to fill in the shadows on the face.

The advantage of this approach is that you don’t need to carry a lot of lighting gear. You can just work with what you have. The disadvantage is that the direct sunlight is really harsh for the skin. All the flaws are visible and you’ll have to “retouch like crazy” as Jay puts it. Also, the sun isn’t always in the same place so you can’t always use it as the key light you’d like to have.

2. Use sunlight as the back/rim light

This is Jay’s favorite way to use the direct sunlight for portraits and he points out that you can pull it off easily when the sun is higher in the sky. But when it comes really low, it will get into the shot and you can use it as a flare, and it will be a “major player” as Jay puts it. Again, you can use a reflector to get more light on the model’s face.

A disadvantage of this approach is that you can’t choose the background because you’re positioning the model in relation to the sun.

3. Use a translucent reflector

You can take the light off of your subject by adding a translucent reflector above your subject. This will diffuse the sunlight and give you beautiful, soft light on the model’s face. On the minus side, a translucent creates a shadow on the ground, so it’s difficult to shoot full body shots. You have to work out how to hide this line so it’s not obvious in the photos.

4. Use a strobe and a translucent reflector

Finally, you can add a strobe and gain a complete control over the lighting situation. You can use the strobe to light the model’s face and you control how bright you want both the model and the background to be. That control you have is, obviously, the advantage of this setup.

The most obvious disadvantage is that you have to have a strobe, and you also should be able to use high speed sync.

Now tell me, how do you pull off portraits in direct sunlight? Do you use any o these techniques, or there’s another method you prefer?

[Laws of Light: Shooting in Direct Sun | The Slanted Lens]

FIND THIS INTERESTING? SHARE IT WITH YOUR FRIENDS!

  • Share
  • Tweet
  • Flipboard
  • WhatsApp

Related posts:

Shooting in direct sunlight? Here are some ways to create shade How to use direct sunlight to your advantage and get some awesome shots How to shoot long exposure timelapse with direct sunlight in the middle of the day This is how to get gorgeous portraits despite harsh sunlight

Filed Under: Tutorials Tagged With: Harsh, jay p morgan, natural light, portrait photography, Sun, Sunlight

About Dunja Djudjic

Dunja Djudjic is a multi-talented artist based in Novi Sad, Serbia. With 15 years of experience as a photographer, she specializes in capturing the beauty of nature, travel, and fine art. In addition to her photography, Dunja also expresses her creativity through writing, embroidery, and jewelry making.

« The new $1 Hot Wheels “Zoom In” car is a miniature GoPro camera dolly in disguise
Man under police investigation for taking a photo of a child at Starbucks »

Submit A Story

Get our FREE Lighting Book

DIYP lighting book cover

* download requires newsletter signup
DIYPhotography

Recent Comments

Free Resources

Advanced lighting book

Recent Posts

  • Sony teases upcoming ZV-E1 full-frame vlogging camera coming on March 29
  • The Xencelabs Pen Display 24 is silent, glare-free retouching tablet
  • Fall in love with astrophotography with these 10 space objects
  • Hipstamatic app relaunches as a social network, but only for iOS
  • Instagram now has ads even in search results. Sigh

Alex Baker is a portrait and lifestyle driven photographer based in Valencia, Spain. She works on a range of projects from commercial to fine art and has had work featured in publications such as The Daily Mail, Conde Nast Traveller and El Mundo, and has exhibited work across Europe

Dave Williams is an accomplished travel photographer, writer, and best-selling author from the UK. He is also a photography educator and published Aurora expert. Dave has traveled extensively in recent years, capturing stunning images from around the world in a modified van. His work has been featured in various publications and he has worked with notable brands such as Skoda, EE, Boeing, Huawei, Microsoft, BMW, Conde Nast, Electronic Arts, Discovery, BBC, The Guardian, ESPN, NBC, and many others.

John Aldred is a photographer with over 20 years of experience in the portrait and commercial worlds. He is based in Scotland and has been an early adopter - and occasional beta tester - of almost every digital imaging technology in that time. As well as his creative visual work, John uses 3D printing, electronics and programming to create his own photography and filmmaking tools and consults for a number of brands across the industry.

Dunja Djudjic is a multi-talented artist based in Novi Sad, Serbia. With 15 years of experience as a photographer, she specializes in capturing the beauty of nature, travel, and fine art. In addition to her photography, Dunja also expresses her creativity through writing, embroidery, and jewelry making.

Copyright © DIYPhotography 2006 - 2023 | About | Contact | Advertise | Write for DIYP | Full Disclosure | Privacy Policy