You don’t need to do anything in particular to get that rim-light. It will be there automatically.

The method you mention there will work. The trick will be to make sure you don’t blow out too much details, but if you get your ambient exposure such that the rim-light and background looks good .. and then add enough flash for proper exposure … then you pretty much can’t fail. It’s a simple method that works.

Neil vN

My question has to do with balancing ambient exposure and flash output when having the sun behind the subject to provide a rim light such as we see in the last two images above. Do I need to do anything to espeically allow for the rim light or does it happen naturally, by which I mean just go ahead and meter for the scene and throw an equivalent amount of flash onto the subject and know that the rim light will be just right?

Thanks!

so filled with info and so much to learn thanks you so much, My brother asked me the other day “are you going to read everything on his website” ?
Guest what my answer was? YES!!!

Nick .. the Nikon 17-55mm f2.8 is an excellent choice for a crop-sensor camera. If you can get it at a reduced price, jump on the chance.

As for off-camera lighting .. I think a softbox is probably the better choice if you’re working alone and using it on a (weighted down) lightstand. The umbrella will most likely grab any wind easier than a softbox would. But .. I am going by guess-work here and not rigorous testing as to which option would fall over the most easily.

Neil vN

I having been photographing properly for about 6months since i bought a d90 with a 18-55mm kit lens and a 50mm prime 1.8 which hasn’t left my camera since i bought it. I like portrait/people photography by far and i have been offered a 17-55mm 2.8 which i have been told is a good lens for family parties/weddings etc, at a very reduced price, any reccomendations?

Also regarding lighting, you mentioned the softbox and assistant on this page, but i doubt im going to be able to have an assistant to hold the box up for me on my shoots, i’ve recently got hold of a sb 600 cheap and would love to get either an umbrella or softbox for multi use to start to understand lighting and get more proffesional results. What would you reccomend?

Thankyou so much! starting out in photography especially all the settings is a mind field, im slowly taking it in, but in bite size chunks, i love it.

Nick !

Ange .. I’ve had a number of Ozzies ask about the workshops. We’ll have to see. :)

Neil vN

Thanks for the speedy reply.
When will you visit our shores here in Australia.
Perhaps a side link to see what sort of numbers you would expect to see, if you were to get some sort of respone.
Im sure your visit would be well represented by your loyal followers down under.

Cheers

Ange

Ange .. it wouldn’t make sense for me to expose correctly for the couple using the ambient exposure. The light on them is to uneven, and they are shaded relative to the background.

So I would have had to take a exposure reading from the background.

Neil vN

In the comment posted by Rob, he questioned the ambient being under exp by 2 stops and your reply was …

12. Rob .. thanks! I didn’t specifically under-expose my ambient by two stops. My main consideration was the exposure for the background… I based my exposure on how I wanted the background to appear in this instance.
.
My questions are -
.
Did you exp for the ambient perse by physically taking a reading from this
.
OR
.
Exp for the subj without flash first and then look at how the background appears. Then added flash to lift the subject. To me this would blow out the background if you exp for subject.
.
Cheers

Ange..