Portraits at sunset

James Paterson shows you how to take vibrant photos of your friends and family at sundown – even if the sun doesn’t appear!

- James Paterson

THE MISSION

Shoot portraits at sunset with a flash

Time needed

One hour

Skill level

Intermediate

Kit needed

• Flash

• Wireless trigger

• Softbox

• Light stand

The magic hour has long been known as the perfect time of day to capture gorgeous landscape photos, but it’s being increasingly used by portrait photographers too. As the sun goes down the vibrant colours can create a stunning backdrop for your portraits. And even if the sky doesn’t erupt into colour, it’s still a great time to head out for dramatic clouds and portraits.

The key technical challenge that you have to overcome is the strong backlighting you get when shooting towards the setting sun. This makes it very tricky to get a balanced exposure, because the subject’s front will be in deep shade. If using the natural light alone we could expose for the shade, but this will blow out the sky; or we could expose for the bright sky, but then the subject will be in silhouette. Both options can lead to great portraits, but if we want to record detail in the sky and the subject at the same time we need to supplement the natural light with some of our own. An off-camera flash is ideal.

A pop of light at the right moment will let us balance out the bold clouds with the light on our subject for a stunning sunset portrait. When it comes to choosing the right light you could use a Speedlite for this, but a stand-alone flash unit gives you more control and power.