Here’s one for the folks that appreciate a small dose of plant photography! Photographers often make little to do about photographing the smaller aspects in light of discussing the larger landscapes, and most of the time (online) you usually see, “photograph flowers in the shade or after a rainstorm,” like I did with my last post. To justify: overcast, diffused light is fantastic for plant photography, and you can’t do without it if you are going to spend any extended amount of time doing this kind of work. However, we can’t overlook the stronger light in this area as well, especially backlight!

If we think backlight is great on human subjects (just go check out any glamour photograph shot back in the nineties), why would we not think it looks awesome on anything else! Keeping an eye out for naturally occurring backlight is a must when shooting landscapes and natural history images! Backlighting provides a certain type of tangibility that is hard to get otherwise, and it offers the smaller elements of a story a unique look and context. Remember, the little things count! Some plants are fairly translucent and offer a great, glowing field of green veins to put a macro lens up next to, while other have a layer of stringy fuzz (no, I’m not a horticulturalist, I do not know what they are called) that blaze when the light hits them just right!

So what do you do to get this type of light? Simple: wake up early! Alright, or inversely, seek that naturally warm light in the evening. Because of atmospheric debris and distance of the Earth to the sun, and because photographers pray every night for great light, early morning and late evening light is just that: awesome light! There’s no exception to backlighting, plants or mammals. You could even create your own backlight, much like I’ve talked about in my posts on high-speed sync flash flower photography.

You’re probably not that far from photographing backlight either! All of the shots in this post (excluding the video) were made within 300 feet from my home. The shot at the beginning of the post (a translucent canon) was taken right off my porch, and the thistles above were just down the fence line in another pasture. Look outside your window, and you probably have something there that glows during the golden hours!

Field Lighting Tip: Backlight. www.jerodfoster.com from Jerod Foster on Vimeo.

Just to drive this concept home, I put together a few clips that emphasize the significance backlighting plays in this type of photography, especially compared to side and front lighting.

I know you’re thinking, “Where’s the people shots?” I like to spread the Field Lighting series over a few areas, but we’ll get back to them soon enough! I’ve been on quite a few shoots lately, and when I get some images ready (and when I’m allowed), I’ll have some people to introduce to you and some stories to tell!

Enjoy!