Flash photography tip: Create your own warm sunlight

Friday 23 May 2025, 14:07 by Elja Trum | 2,681 views | 2 comments

This article was translated from Dutch with the help of AI. Read the original.

Even on a dull day, you want to take beautiful, atmospheric photos. Your flash can help you imitate sunlight. You can recreate the warm colour of a rising (or setting) sun by putting an orange colour filter (CTO) on your flash, or by flashing into a gold-coloured reflector.

Regina Piil - f/2.8, 1/160s, 100 ISO @ 173mm
Of course, pay attention to the direction of the light. From the side usually works best, but you also need to consider a logical position for the sun. Especially if there is real sunlight visible in the background too. If the direction differs, your viewer will quickly realise that something is not right.

Make sure your flash fires just a little harder, about 1 stop, than the ambient light, so the effect is still clearly visible, but not exaggerated or causing blown-out areas.

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About the author

Elja Trum is the founder of Photofacts and online photography course website Photofacts Academy. He has been writing about photography since 2006. Elja is also the author of (Dutch) books on composition, black-and-white photography, flash photography and portrait photography.

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2 comments

guest wrote on Tuesday 27 May 2025 at 16:31 | reply
Nice article. You indicate that the flash fires just a little brighter (approximately 1 stop) than the ambient light. But how do you determine the amount of ambient light?
Translated from Dutch.

Elja Trum wrote on Tuesday 27 May 2025 at 16:46 | reply
You can of course measure that with a (flash) light meter. If your flash meter does not measure ambient light, you can use the readings from your camera's light meter.

But it is also perfectly doable 'by eye' based on your camera's screen and the histogram (if you don't have a flash meter). That will take you a few photos to get the light the way you want it. Make sure (in the histogram) that no blown-out areas appear.
Translated from Dutch.

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