Backlighting in photography is a way for photographers to create spectacular lighting, whether in the studio (for things like portrait photography) or when shooting outdoors. Learning backlight photography techniques can help you improve your photography considerably.

Backlighting in photography involves positioning the main light source of a photograph behind the main subject.

Backlighting is a popular technique among experienced photographers, but it can also present unique exposure and compositional challenges. Amateur photographers need to take the time to learn backlight photography, and expect a lot of trial and error in their first attempts. Once you’ve mastered this skill, you’ll find yourself using it again and again to produce striking, dramatically lit images.

As the example above illustrates, in most photographs, backlighting occurs when the main object is photographed from the front or at an angle, while the primary light source (often a bright light source, such as the sun) is either directly behind the subject, or simply behind the object.

If the photo is exposed according to the light source, as in the example above where the exposure has been set to sky light, the result is a strong contrast, which often makes the subject of the photo appear as a silhouette or shadow, usually very attractive. In this case, the object is underexposed. On the other hand, if you set your exposure to the object, the background where the light source is located will be overexposed, and therefore very bright.

But this high level of contrast is not necessarily the desired effect, and it is of course entirely possible to compensate for it by using other light sources to illuminate the subject, from the front or from another angle. It can be a piece of accessory equipment, such as a flash, lamp or reflector, but also and above all an element of the decor, such as a white wall or window that will act as a reflection for the sunlight.

The HDR technique can be used to extend the dynamic range of the image. A large number of identical images of the same object, the only difference being that they are obtained with different exposure levels, are mixed on the computer using a special computer tool.

Maximum utilization of the vacant dynamic range in the same image with a well-developed IT tool, having taken the images in the format RAW is the only condition for achieving this, the RAW file is a raw image file that can be recorded by the camera, usually a DSLR, owns a wider dynamic range than the dynamic range of a JPEG image file. All you need is more or less efficient computer software, to get an image that’s almost identical to that obtained using the HDR technique.