Natural Light Vs. Off-Camera Flash

Natural Light Vs Off-Camera Flash

Using Natural Light versus an off-camera flash are both great methods for photography. Using these types of lighting will add more to your photography profile.

 

Natural Light:

Shooting in natural light can have its advantages and disadvantages. Some of the difficulties that can be a factor are exposing your image. Let’s say It’s a sunny day and you’re in a bright area. Sunlight will change often and will be challenging for your photographs. Sometimes the sun will come up and then disappear. So, you have to constantly change your f/stop and ISO to capture to capture the image you want. This will help you if you are starting out, figuring out your settings and seeing what each setting is doing to your picture. Once you get that own you will have a better understanding and be able to change your settings a lot faster and adapt quickly to the changes.

If you are using natural light indoors, make sure you know how to use window light. The closer that you are to the window the more light will be on your subject. If you place your subject in relation to the window it will give a dramatic effect to your image. You can do a variety of things with window light as your light source. You could have your subject be parallel to at a small angle towards the window. This allows more contrast depending on the time of day you are shooting. Have your subject facing you with their back to the window. While using a reflector to pop the light onto the subject’s face, it sets up for an interesting photo. You can also have your subject facing the window, to give more light to the subject.

 

Model posing with fairy lights (natural light)

 

 Off Camera Flash:

While shooting with an off-camera flash you will also have advantages and disadvantages. With the off-camera flash, you are able to control the light and have the same amount of light anywhere you go. Like stated above, you must keep changing your settings with natural light. Whereas off camera flash you don’t need to worry about that since you have the same amount of light and have control. One of the disadvantages of using this type of light is you have to keep that model in a certain area for that time and it limits you to what you can do.

With natural light, you are freer to move around to different areas to get different types of lighting. So, you are limited to what you can do with an off-camera flash. If you are using this outdoors you can use a high-speed flash sync. This allows you to use a wider aperture, depending on how bright your surroundings are. When using this method, try to match the sunlight with your flash. This lifts the shadows for better exposure do there aren’t details lost in your image.

Using these types of lighting are great for expanding your photography skills. Both have great advantages and some disadvantages but both are great to use. You can also mix these lighting styles together to create something interesting as well.

 

Off camera flash