…With Just a Speedlight
I know, I know. Crazy, right? But it can be done! If you want to take a beautiful portrait with that lovely black background, but zero access to a studio, there is a handy way to adjust your camera’s settings in order to get exactly that.
This photo was taken in a lit room, and I only used a speedlight with a narrow snoot in order to light up her face. One handy tip to remember is whenever you’re using a speedlight, be sure to keep your shutter speed at around 1/60th-1/200th of a second in order to avoid getting an annoying black bar across your photos. For this image above, my shutter speed was 1/200 and my f-stop was f/13. Using a smaller aperture size means that less light gets in, which means black background! Take a couple test shots without the speedlight to make sure that your photos are completely dark.
I know. The set up is pretty un-glamorous and very simple. I’ve found for best results with the speedlight, you don’t want the flash to go directly on their face. Getting it closer to their temple or cheek will throw the rest of their face in shadow, which gives it a great mysterious look. Also, you can see that I have the snoot partially open on the speedlight so the light isn’t so concentrated in one spot.
Ta-da! And here’s the image I got from the set up I showed just above. Of course, sometimes you’ll get a bit of light in the background. Just go into Photoshop or Lightroom to tweak the background and it’s an easy fix.
You don’t need to just take portraits with this method either! You can take pictures of whatever subject you want and, with a little practice, the results look amazing. The world is your oyster.
If you’re unsure how to use a speedlight, or if you’re having problems syncing it with your camera, check out this article on ImprovePhotography.com! It’ll teach you all you need to know.
So go forth my friends, and use this simple skill to take incredible portraits!
