How to get a dark background and expose subject correctly with flash

I just wrote this for another forum but thought I would share with you lot. Sorry If its teaching some to suck eggs
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I put the camera in manual and metered the shot on evalutive metering true exposure was iso 100 1/20 f4.5.

That exposed the scene great but thats not what the idea is here.

I wanted to darken the bg to really bring focus on the sbject so I turned the shutter speed up 2 stops.

So I am now set to 1/80 f4.5 iso 100.

Giving me 2 stops under exposed for the bg.

Took a shot definatly dark!

You can take a few shots espically if shooting with sky in th bg to see what setting is best to bring out the sky.

You dont have to go two stops under you may only want one or half or one and a half its up to you to how you want to expose the BG but this is a guide to show you how to get it dark.


Next I postion myself where I want to stand and put a flashgun out to my left as close as i can get it out of frame. ( same again this can me whatever side you want it to be)

I then took my flash meter and dialled in the shutter speed and iso

I fired the flash and took a reading bit low at first. So I kept turning up the power and repeating until it reads f4.5

That means that the part im metering (myself) is exposed correctly with the flash.

If you dont have a flash meter you can put something there ( like a jacket on a monopod) and keep shooting it and turning power up until you reach the blinkies then dial it back a bit.

Then your done

You can then take the shot resulting in your subject being exposed correctly and having a darker bg


This works really well when you want dark moody skies in a shot as well as a good exposure on your subject

Hope this is useful to some people

This is quite standard for combining flash with ambient when you want the flash to be key. However, you don't really need a meter at all. The whole procedure can be done in aperture priority mode with exposure compensation set to -1.5 or -2.0EV. Then use your flash with either zero or +0.5 or +1.0 flash exposure compensation in ETTL. Works like a charm.

Also, in the photo shown, your flash was not out to camera left, but rather to camera right. And it was not that close to the lens, as the shadows on the camera left size of the face are quite pronounced.

By the way, it's a very nice photo.

I was basing this on being off cam with a basic manual flash.

Thank you on the compliment for the photo. it was only a quick job.

Ettl is easy like you say, but it takes away the thought behind it. A lot of people say yeah great i have some pw i can shoot ettl of cam.

There are still a lot of people that shoot manual with th yn range of flashes on a budget and this is who this is aimed at beginners in the flash world.

I always used to think how was that done when I was learning.

When I say my left I meant the person as I am the one in the photo as its a self portrait as well.

I know this is basic stuff but remember there was once a time when you wanted to learn basic stuff

The flash was about 45deg to camera bare bulb as well

Hugh's comment was for use of ETTL, but the principles remain the same nevertheless.

• With a purely manual flash, you need to set the flash portion of the exposure (rather than the camera commanding the ETTL flash) and that can be done...

  ... via trial and error;
  ...or via know Guide Number arithmetic (which is made more difficult in view of the modern zoom flash head!);
  ...or via a flashmeter

• Ambient exposure determination is identical, whether with ETTL or with manual flash.