Flash Photography Tips ...
Loose that Red-Eye and Bleached-Out Foreground...

Flash photography tips will help you understand how to use your flash to get the best pictures you can. Many beginners struggle with flash photography. So many times pictures taken with a flash look harshly lit, flat and have unnatural shadows. Objects in the foreground get bleached of color from the bright white flash. The person you're photographing has bright red monster eyes. Flash photography can look a mess. Especially, when you're just guessing what to do.

I'm going to help you take some of the guess work out of flash photography. Knowing how and when to use a flash will help you take great pictures. It's also important to know when to turn your flash off. Many people just assume they need to use a flash if the area is dimly lit. Most times you get better results if you put your caamera on a tripod and have a longer exposure time or add some extra lighting in addition to a flash in the area. Anyway, I'll get to that later. Right now we're talking about flashe photography tips.

Avoiding Red-Eye

The first of my flash photography tips will show you how to avoid red-eye. We all know about that red-eyed monster that sometimes shows up in our pictures. Luckily, that once pesky problem is easily fixed now.

Red-eye is caused by the light of the flash reflecting off the back of the eye. One way cameras deal with this problem is to set off a pre-flash before the actual picture is taken. This constricts the pupil preventing red-eye. Other cameras use a strobe effect, setting off a series of small bursts of light before the flash. Other cameras have internal software that correct the problem once the picture is taken.

Set your camera to the red-eye prevention flash or mode.

If you look at your picture on the computer and that red-eye is still there, your photo editing software will have a red-eye correction tool.

Fill Flash

So it's a bright sunny day. I think I'll use my flash to take a picture outside. Crazy right! Not so crazy. This is one of the great flash photography tips I learned in college.

A flash can be used to fill in dark spots and shadows that may occur in a photo if no flash was used. It's great for a situation where your subject is lit from behind or from the side. The flash will throw light into the dark shadowy spaces.

In the above picture I used a flash. If I didn't use the flash the person in the picture would appear to be just a shadow because the room was dim and the sunlight was streaming in the window behind him.

When the sunlight hits your subject it will almost always cause harsh shadows. Sometimes you want to work with those shadows for effect. Most of the time you want to get rid of them.

Cameras have different types of flashes. You'll have to read your manual to learn about the different flash settings on your camera.

If you find that your flash is too harsh, you should adjust the brightness of it. With a point and shoot camera, you usually can't do that. A good solution to this problem is taping a thin piece of paper or even a piece of light filter over your flash. Experiment with this technique to control the brightness.

Flash and Your DSLR

Point and shoot cameras have a flash that is just way too close to the lens. That's a big problem. DSLR's usually have a flash that pops up from the top of the camera. You can also control the intensity of your flash. That means there are even more flash photography tips that can be used when using a DSLR.

The other great thing about a DSLR is that you can use a hand held or free standing flash. This gives you the freedom to point your flash in a different direction than the camera, softening the flash and giving a more natural look.

A slow flash is when a flash is used with a slow shutter speed in a dimly lit situation. This is great for allowing for good exposure of both the subject and background for night shots. You need to use a tripod to get a good effect though, otherwise the image will be blurring.

Here are some flash photography tips that will help you put motion in your pictures.

Having your flash fire at the tail end of a long exposure will give you the effect of forward motion in your picture.

A strobe flash can be used to capture multiple images in motion in a shot.

More General Flash Photography Tips

Before you take a picture with a flash check the area that will be in the picture. Are their any reflective surfaces--mirrors, shiny metal surfaces, a bald head? These will cause bursts of light in your picture that you might not want. Cover or move those objects before you take the picture. You might want to try reframing the shot all together.

Consider turning the flash off. Take a picture with the flash and one without. Compare to see which picture you like best. Many people with point and shot cameras get stuck in automatic mode letting the camera decide when they should and shouldn't use the flash for them. Set your camera on manuel control and start making the decisions when to use the flash. You'll get much better pictures that way.