Shooting Effect and Skills of Backlight Portrait

Lead: The master said that you can shoot with light, but many photographers think that only backlighting is king! This article will introduce the types, effects and shooting skills of various backlights, so don't miss it ~!

Backlight point

The light spots under the backlight are round, diamond-shaped, dotted and atomized, which is very beautiful!

Shooting opportunity

To produce the effect of facula, a powerful "point light source" is needed. At this time, it will be beneficial to have a light source with hard light quality and strong light quantity. For example, the sun is in a relatively high position, or the light emitted by the light is directed at the lens, which is the case. Sometimes the low-angle sun also has the opportunity to form a light spot, but the amount of sunlight near sunset will be weak, which will easily weaken the light spot into white fog.

Shooting method

There are roughly two kinds of "spot" effects produced by backlight. For example, small white bubbles are called "bubble type" and small white bubbles are called "diamond pattern". Whether it is "bubble type" or "diamond pattern", the shape of the light spot has little to do with the photographing method, but it is definitely related to the equipment. For example, a fixed-focus lens has a strong ability to suppress the facula effect. Zoom lenses are relatively easy to produce and will vary according to the coating and material of each lens.

The spot shapes of "bubbles" and "diamond patterns" are formed by mechanical blades that control the aperture of the lens. Their change lies in the size of the aperture. If we open a large aperture, we will produce a "bubble" spot. If we narrow the aperture, we will produce a "diamond pattern" spot, but when the aperture is fully opened, it is not a "bubble" spot. It depends on whether the aperture of your lens is large enough and whether the mechanical blade can be opened to a circle. Otherwise, it is a "diamond pattern" or a bubble point at the corner. The "diamond pattern" also has the so-called octagon and hexagon, which depends on the number of mechanical blades of your lens.

tip

But not as long as it is a fixed-focus lens. For example, Canon 50 mm F 1.2 L can also shoot the facula effect, depending on the characteristics of each lens.

Ordinary backlight

There are two kinds of backlight, one is "front backlight" and the other is "side backlight". In any case, when the sun is placed directly behind the model, I classify it as general backlight. If the sun is directly photographed in the picture, it is called "positive backlight", and if the sun is not photographed in the picture, it is called "side backlight".

Shooting method

The general shooting method is relatively simple. As long as you shoot against the light, you can use the "light and shade method" at most, and there is almost no difficulty. However, this type of backlight effect is easy to produce side light and head light. What is more difficult is that the position of the sun in a day is high or low, which will affect the shooting effect, and how to judge and choose the picture we want is the main point of general backlight consideration.

When the sun is still high, you have to kneel down to reflect the light, but sometimes the low-angle picture is not so ideal and the atmosphere is not easy to control. It would be much easier if the oblique light appeared.

Flapping method of side backlight

Although it is called "side backlight", it is not necessary to put the sun on the side, as long as it is not photographed, no matter where the light is, it can be called.

The application of "positive backlight" and "side backlight" is that if the contrast of positive backlight is too large, the subject will be too dark, and if the subject is very bright, the background will be completely overexposed and turn white. At this time, the contrast can be controlled by "side backlight" to avoid overexposure of the picture. In addition, the side backlight does not need to be obsessed with avoiding light, but simply wants to reduce the excessive contrast between light and shade caused by direct sunlight.

When the sun is too strong, although the light quantity is controlled by "dimming method", the contrast between positive and negative light is still great.

At this time, we can consider using "side backlight" to control the contrast.

White atomized backlight

The phenomenon of white fog under backlight is also divided into two different situations, one is under strong light and the other is under weak light, and the effect of fog spots is slightly different.

Shooting method

The intensity of white fog is also related to the equipment, but it is not the lens itself, but the difference in focal length. Because this kind of backlight is the result of diffraction in the lens when the light source enters the camera, the longer your focal length, the more opportunities and times the light diffracts in the lens, the easier it will be. At this time, the greater the opening of the aperture blade, the best effect is to let the light source directly enter the lens. Because of the use of 35mm, 50mm and 85mm fixed-focus lenses, 35 mm lens is not easy to shoot, 85mm lens is easy to produce fog, and 50mm lens is easy to produce under direct strong light.

Because Xiaobai doesn't have a zoom lens at hand, the above conclusion still needs to be verified on the zoom lens. When the light source is too weak, or the indoor window light is used to create a big contrast, the result will also be atomized, but the effect is different from that under strong light. Yes, the fog in low light is produced when the light penetrates into a black object with high contrast, so there is only a faint white fog, which is different from the situation that the screen is completely atomized by strong light. White fog under strong light actually needs a black object as the base, which is obvious, so you can choose a background with high contrast or use the model's body as the base. These are the techniques of using white fog to backlight.

Shooting opportunity

This kind of backlight has nothing to do with shooting time and light quality, but the color of light will have different atomization effects, such as white light will produce white fog and yellow light will produce yellow fog.

Strong light or weak light atomization requires black substrate to be more obvious.

Edge fogging often occurs in weak light or indoor window light.

Sunset backlight

Shooting opportunity

Since they said it was a sunset, it must have been taken at sunset. Sunset backlight is actually a kind of general backlight, but why should it be separated? Because the sunset backlight focuses on the shooting opportunity, the sunset backlight may be the most beautiful of all backlight types, and it is also Xiaobai's favorite backlight type. When the sun is completely before sunset, there will be a period of soft light quality and slightly golden yellow temperature. At this time, the contrast will be smaller, so the shooting process is easier to control. This prime time will last about 1 hour, and the time point and duration will vary from season to season. It is about 5 pm in summer and 4 pm in winter. There will be soft light in the morning, but this prime time will appear earlier, about 5 or 6 am in summer and 7 or 8 am in winter.

Shooting method

Sunset backlighting, like ordinary backlighting, is not too difficult, especially in prime time, and the situation will be better controlled. I just want to shoot a beautiful sunset, and it is very important to choose scenery and survey, but if you are happy with it, it is another matter. It's just that sometimes if we want to shoot a theme, the content is to use the sunset backlight to create a certain degree of comfort, then we should pay special attention to the time problem. On the day of shooting, we will wait at the shooting location before the prime time, so that we can do enough preparation and homework, and the result will truly present the picture we imagined. As the sun gets closer to the horizon, the color temperature will turn yellow and the skin color will gradually darken, which is difficult for any powerful software to handle. At this time, if you don't want to call it a day, and don't want to shoot any more, you don't have to shine at the moment, so it's great to shoot a beautiful silhouette instead.