The last direction light can come from is behind your subject. This can create some fun and exciting effects in your images and is one of my favourite ways to play with creativity in the field. Most silhouettes rely on backlighting, using the strong contrast between a bright sky and a darker subject to create simple, graphic shapes that really stand out.
In the shot accompanying this post, I manually set the exposure to place the sun as a medium orange, which in turn rendered my subject as a clean silhouette. When you’re setting up a shot like this, you’ll be surprised by how quickly the sun actually moves through the frame. If you try to chase it, you’ll constantly be recomposing. Instead, it’s much easier to frame your subject a little ahead of where the sun will be and let the sun move into your composition.
A practical safety tip: avoid staring directly at the sun through the viewfinder, especially with longer lenses. One great workaround is to use Live View to frame the scene, so you’re not looking straight into that very bright disk. Thanks to Glenn Nagel for that last tip!
Backlighting isn’t just for silhouettes. I also love to use it when shooting translucent subjects. For example, when I’m photographing leaves, I often position the leaf so the sun is directly behind it. This type of lighting makes the leaf glow and really shows off the vein patterns and subtle colour shifts that you might otherwise miss.
Rim-lighting is another effect you can achieve with backlighting. In this case, the main light source is often hidden behind the subject. You base your exposure on the shaded side of the subject, allowing the light that spills around the edges from behind to appear as a bright outline or halo. This halo emphasizes the shape of your subject and helps separate it from the background, adding depth and a bit of drama to the scene.
Backlighting can be tricky at first, but once you start to understand how it behaves — and how your camera meters and records it — it becomes a powerful tool in your creative toolbox.
Next week we’ll start talking about the quality of the light.
Good Luck and Good Light!
Steve
Image: Dewy Skipper Butterfly and Sun