Sun or Shade, which is best?
What’s the best lighting conditions for taking photos? OK, so that’s a rhetorical question as there is no ideal light for every occasion but light does have the power to influence your enthusiasm for photography.
Be honest, when you look out the window on a grey overcast day where the chances of rain is fairly high, the last thing that’s on your mind is grabbing your camera and taking some photos. Of course the flip side is as soon as the sun comes out, everyone’s up for a bit of photo fun.
If that sounds like you then think carefully before taking photos of people or objects in direct sun as the contrast can often be to much for most cameras to capture.
The photo above illustrates the problem and a solution.
The image on the left is full sun and trust me, it looked perfect to my eyes. However the camera couldn’t see what I saw and the resulting image is a contrasty mess.
To improve the photo I simply used my hand (just out of shot) to cast a shadow over the flower and the end result is much improved colours and contrast.
So next time you’re out on a sunny day remember to look in the shade for your best photos.
Yep, I do that all the time taking photos like those above.
To me the sunny one looks better, the shaded one looks dull.
Thanks Gavin, a simple tip but highly effective.
I like this article. Well you’re right that sometimes shade is better. However, I believe that it works for small objects, but not for landscapes. I mean, if you’ve got a very grey sky, with a dense cloud cover and no details, pictures often look not-so-interesting 🙂
Simple but great tip. Soon to get a macro lens and try this close up shooting so i’ll remeber this tip!
P.s Great site and very useful info. Keep up the good work.
True, but when I look at the right picture, it reminds me about other problem I’ve got, perhaps someone can help: as soon as I try to shoot a flower in bright color like red or yellow, my Canon7d makes an awful bright mess out of it. It looks rather like a red soup with too little color range in it… I tried changing aperture, time, etc… will not get better. Perhaps I should photograph such bright colors after sunset… Has anybody got an idea? Thanks!