Super 10 strokes to complete silhouette photography

Silhouette photo is a traditional form of artistic photography. It can refine and process the complex scenes we see into a sharp contrast silhouette effect, thus making the theme of the shot work more prominent and the picture more concise. Give everyone a deep and strong feeling.

At the same time, it creates a subtle mysterious artistic conception, which attracts people's association and aftertaste, greatly enhancing the artistic appeal of the photos.

1, looking for a suitable scene

The silhouette must be backlit. Take the sunset, the most commonly used silhouette, as an example. The position of the sun needs to be behind the main body.

We can use backlight at sunrise and sunset, because the light is the softest at this time, so we should choose the position and angle in advance.

The principle of shooting with other light sources is the same except shooting with the afterglow of sunset. Simply put, it is to find a backlight position and turn the subject into a shadow.

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Step 2 find the theme

Looking for an interesting prospect, it should have a clear and concise edge. Also choose a bright and clean background, such as description or water surface.

In order to add highlights to the background, you can shoot at sunrise or sunset. At this time, the light changes in the sky are more diverse.

3. Selection of background

When shooting a silhouette, we need to find a silhouette with a strong sense of form and a bright background.

Usually the sky is the background, and if there is some water vapor or slight fog in the air, the effect is also very good. When shooting, avoid the effect that the light source illuminates the foreground panorama. In other words, you need to shoot against the light at this time. And the background such as the sky should not be too messy, so as not to affect the atmosphere of the whole picture.

When choosing a silhouette, you must be careful and choose an object with an easily recognizable shape and a clear outline. Such as trees, people or animals. Avoid styling too big a theme. It would be unsightly to see a large area of black on the screen.

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4, the use of manual mode and semi-automatic mode

In general, the shutter speed increases and the aperture decreases. In this way, the subject can be almost completely black as far as possible, and the background can show the best silhouette effect with color.

Use manual gear (M gear), rotating speed 1000-4000th of a second, aperture10 or above, ISO200-400 (see the light at that time for specific values); Exposure should follow the principle of underexposure rather than overexposure, and exposure measurement should be made according to the background.

Using semi-automatic mode (such as aperture priority), we can adjust the camera to "focus metering" (or spot metering) mode, and use the brightest range of the background for metering. By pressing AE-Lock key, we can lock the exposure value and easily show the silhouette effect.

5. Use the trisection method

At this time, the composition should be concise, so that the picture can look good. You can use the classic trisection method to place the required subject horizontally and vertically in one third of the picture, leaving the other side blank. Even if the subject is not big, it will become the visual center of the picture.

6. Read exposure value.

When taking a silhouette, set the parameters according to the exposure value of the background. Manual exposure can combine the exposure value of each point. You can also use the semi-automatic exposure mode to adjust the exposure compensation of the camera to darken the foreground and make the background exposure normal.

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7. Lighting equipment

Obviously, silhouette is a masterpiece of backlight. The basic idea behind this is that the brightness of the foreground and the "object" you are facing is negligible compared with the brightness of the background. To understand the mystery, you must learn to "think and observe" things like a camera.

If you accidentally take a silhouette, you will know that what the camera sees is completely different from what you see. Sometimes under bright backlight conditions, the subject seen by the naked eye is still good, but the final shot is a silhouette. The fundamental reason for this gap is that cameras are very different from human eyes.

8. Pay attention to the perspective

When shooting, it should be noted that the subject must not be rigid, and should not be blocked by annoying buildings or simple sculptures. In addition, be careful if there are many people shooting pictures.

If the silhouette overlaps too much, it will give people a sense of confusion and ambiguity. In shooting, try to make every object clearly identifiable, even from the perspective of a single object.

9. Highlight the subject through a black silhouette.

When the proportion of the subject in the picture is too small or the picture is blank and monotonous, silhouette can be creatively used as the foreground. Black silhouette can not only oppress the audience's vision of the subject, but also not distract the audience.

We can even use the silhouette as the main frame to form square, round or varied shapes, so that ordinary scenery has a unique sense of form and increases the depth of the picture.

10, overlapping trend

One of the shooting themes you usually see is "kissing silhouette", where two people hug and kiss each other, but the final shooting result is a bit weird because their faces overlap too much.

If you plan to imitate this kind of shooting, you should try to "coincide" with the situation before and after kissing, so as to get better performance. Remember, this principle is not only necessary for silhouette, but also applicable to any two objects with overlapping tendency in photographic works.

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