You can use a flash on or off-camera. Single flash tilted about 60 degrees toward the top with the bounce card up to bounce light back onto the girl’s face. This result can sometimes be inconsistent lighting frame-to-frame, but it’s helpful when you need to work quickly without having much time to change the settings. The photo on the left has no flash. It takes some practice to achieve good results, so don’t worry if you don’t get it right the first time. Single flash used off-camera on a stand. Flash, on-camera, works really well during portraits when you need to add a pop of light, or to bounce light to fill in shadows. The ability to trigger your flash while not attached to your camera can offer lots of different creative lighting angles too. You’re more likely to achieve more studio-like lighting to your portraits using off-camera flash. This allows the photographer to capture the body proportions correctly. At a beach, for example, place the flash on the camera and angle it toward your clients. ... On the other hand, you can quite easily fake showing the sun in the background behind a portrait subject by using a gel to warm up the light. And finally, soft light is all about the size of light relative to your subject – if you have a flash on your camera and can’t use a diffuser or get it off the camera, try either bouncing off the ceiling (making sure your subjects tilt their head up slightly to avoid raccoon eyes), or find a white wall – have your subjects stand close to it and bounce the flash off the wall onto your subjects. For example, if you’re following a child running along the seashore, your on-camera flash goes with you and fires each time you hit the shutter fully. This is often attached to the hot shoe at the top of your camera. With off-camera flash, you’ll need to use a radio transmitter/trigger of some sort. Some of my favorite advantages of off camera flash photography (OCF): You’re not limited to the light that a window is giving you, or a certain time of day where there’s perfect light. However, choose one that is made to work with your camera brand. Consumer-level cameras come with a built-in flash. Don’t be intimidated if you’ve never used an off-camera flash. Off-Camera Flash. Certainly for night stuff. While most flash systems are pretty good in their own right, you’ll want to invest a bit in a flash that is able to be used in both manual and TTL modes. For example, you can leave the flash power at a consistent output and change the ISO and aperture to achieve the desired look you want. It is amazing how simple it was to set up one Nikon Speed Light off camera … Lock in those settings and sprinkle in some off camera flash to make the couple pop. If you’re competing with midday sunlight, with the flash on your camera, you can fill in shadows as you photograph your client. However, the portrait on the right is using the flash off-camera left. Use TTL when you need to fire the flash quickly without wasting time with the settings. Set shutter release to “Single”, so that your flash does not fire multiple shots as you squeeze the camera shutter. Many people think that professional looking portraits of either people or animals require a multiple light setup in a studio. © 2006 - 2020 Digital Photography School, All Rights On the right, no flash, same location and time. The traditional configuration consists of a main light, a fill light, sometimes a hair light depending on the hair—or lack of hair—of the subject, and two lights on the background.