Comments on: Flash Silhouettes – How I Took It

By: Don

Don — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 14:30:32 +0000

Interesting technique. People talk about “reverse silhouette” but what is this? A pure white object against a black background?

I’ll give it a go. Something different from the black on white sillhouette.
Don

By: Ben Michalski

Ben Michalski — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 15:23:36 +0000

As my friend and teacher Christopher Grey say’s ” other than the law’s of physics..there are no rules to photography” I think it’s a nice shot. But then photography is a subjective artform to everyone….except photographers.:)

By: Jeff

Jeff — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 04:23:17 +0000

Guys, these photographs are what this person finds appealing. Photography isn’t always about accurate reproduction of an object. As much as one painter uses his brush one way, another uses it completely different and yet both can produce interesting art.

By: Darren

Darren — Tue, 24 Apr 2007 03:02:02 +0000

as the comments here reflect – this isn’t a technique for everyone (nor is it one that I think anyone including the author says is perfect). I guess it shows us yet again just how much personal preferences play a part in determining what is good photography.

thanks everyone for the comments.

By: wingerz

wingerz — Tue, 24 Apr 2007 02:27:50 +0000

I like these. I am tempted to play around with the technique because using the flash to illuminate a tree can give you a much better idea of how the branches are arranged in 3D space. It’s effectively drawing a depth map on whatever you are photographing. It would be fun to try this on something with a dense network of branches, maybe shooting straight up from underneath.

By: Gareth

Gareth — Tue, 24 Apr 2007 02:01:27 +0000

I prefer to use this technique in daylight. Expose the foreground for the flash effectively turning the background black. That way you don't have to sacrifice the foreground detail. LIke this photo

By: Bob

Bob — Mon, 23 Apr 2007 22:25:57 +0000

I love the technique and could see a large print of such a shot hanging above my fireplace – thanks, I’m going to give it a go.

By: Another Nature Photographer

Another Nature Photographer — Mon, 23 Apr 2007 18:28:00 +0000

The first shot works better than the second one. In the first photo there’s some symmetry that looks nice and everything is uniformly bright. The second, to me, just looks like a mistake where the light from the flash illuminated the wrong thing. This is something I’ve done accidentally many times.

By: mdwsta4

mdwsta4 — Mon, 23 Apr 2007 18:11:01 +0000

raoul, that’s the exact same thing i said. it’s an overexposed picture of a tree branch.
and it’s not ’silhouettey’ enough to really be a reverse silhouette.

By: schmee

schmee — Mon, 23 Apr 2007 17:14:02 +0000

couldn’t this entire article have been summed up as “see tree at night, use camera”?

these last few How I Took It posts have been a bit of a stretch imho.