How To Prevent Bright Ears In Camera So You Don't Have To Worry About It In Post Production

Have you ever noticed how a person’s ears sometimes glow in portraits when they are backlit? Because ears are more transparent than the rest of our bodies, they tend to catch and diffuse any light that is shining through them, kinda like the way a softbox works. To that end, you can imagine how silly it would look if the subject of a portrait had two tiny, glowing softboxes on each side of their head. You can see why glowing ears just aren’t that desirable in portraits. If you’ve ever spent time in Photoshop trying to fix it, you’ll be grateful for this little tips from professional photographer, Glyn Dewis.

The little hack isn’t technically done “in camera”, but it’s definitely along those lines and is an excellent tool to know about. And, if you have a roll of gaffers tape laying around, you won’t need to purchase any new equipment. Simply grab a little piece of the tape and stick it behind the subject’s ears before you start shooting. It will block out light from shining through and save you some aggravation during post production. Just be careful so you don’t press it on to hard or get their hair in it for obvious reasons.

It seems like black electrical tape may also work well and not be so sticky, but I haven’t personally tried it out yet. If the skin was a little oily, there might be some difficulty getting it to stick at all. If you do some experimenting, be sure to leave us a comment below and share your findings.

In the interim, check out Dewis’ video, here: