Bounce flash

Bouncing the flash is an effective alternative to direct flash. Bouncing the light from a flash involves directing your flash head at a reflective surface so that light striking the subject off the surface becomes more spread out and is less unidirectional. This tends to soften the illumination and produce more natural-looking portraits and other pictures. Bounce flash is also effective in eliminating red-eye.

YOUR FLASH HEAD MUST TILT

Bounce flash requires a tilting flash head for a camera-mounted flash (sometimes called a bounce/swivel head), enabling you to aim your camera at the subject while the light is directed elsewhere. If the flash is hand-held (off-camera), it needs merely to be aimed at the reflective surface. The flash head must be tilted at least 60 to bounce light off the ceiling. If set at 90, bounce flash can be very effective and you can use your flash's bounce card, if it has one built-in, to create a highlight in the subject's eyes. (The bounce card reflects a small amount of light directly onto the subject, making the eyes look more lively and brightening up the shadows.) Some flash guns have a secondary flash built in below the main swivel head that is used to provide fill illumination when the main flash is bounced.

LIGHT BOUNCED OFF THE CEILING LOOKS NATURAL

The ceiling or a wall can be effective reflectors, however they must be white in color to avoid casting a tone on your subject when using color film. A red or blue wall, for instance, will transfer its redness or blueness to your subject, creating unnatural-looking skin tones in portraits and adding color where it is not meant to be in other subjects. Light bounced off a ceiling has the advantage of a natural look, similar to daylight coming from above.

When the ceiling is very high, bounce flash can result in underexposure. Set your camera's ISO sensitivity higher, and bounce flash will result in proper exposure.

If the ceiling is too high (say, 11 or 12 feet or more for a person of normal height standing beneath it), the light will be spread over too wide an area and illumination striking your subject will be too diminished. Many photographers use commercially-available reflectors, including umbrella-type reflectors, white bounce cards and shiny surface reflectors that fold into a relatively-small carrying case. (One commonly-used white surface is found on the back side of an 18%-reflectance gray card.)

"Home-grown" reflectors, using white cardboard, illustration board, styrofoam and other materials, can also be quite effective. In a pinch, bouncing your flash off a sheet of white copy paper will do a fine job.

BOUNCED FLASH CAN ALTER COLOR TONES

Colored reflectors will alter the tones of your subject. Gold reflective surfaces, for instance, will warm skin tones. Silver is highly reflective and simulates daylight. Even colored poster board will reflect its color onto your subject. Other options include shiny "space blankets," white bedsheets and vinyl.

MOVE YOUR FLASH BEHIND THE SUBJECT & BOUNCE ITS LIGHT

A photographer can accentuate any part of a subject dependent upon where the flash and reflector are located. Aiming an off-camera flash at the rear of a subject, for example, will strongly backlight it, but a reflector at the front of the subject will redirect light back to the camera side of the subject for pleasing illumination.

WATCH YOUR BOUNCE ANGLE

Although bounce flash gets rid of the spotlight effect from direct flash, the results are not always all that pleasing. For instance, light bounced off a ceiling at too tight an angle will cast too much shadow in a subject’s eyes and under the nose and chin.

You may get an unwanted combination of direct and bounced flash if the angle of the flash head is not far enough off axis from the subject.

You must visualize how the reflected light will illuminate the subject, and choose an angle for the bounced light that will be most flattering. If you are concerned that a close-up subject’s eyes may be darkened by a steep bounce angle, place a white or silver-surfaced reflector under your subject’s chin to fill in shadow areas.

DISTANCE FOR EXPOSURE CALCULATIONS

Where flash exposure must be calculated (with manual flash units), use the total distance the light travels from the flash to the reflective surface and then back to the subject.

BOUNCE FLASH HOODS

Commercially-available bounce cards (or bounce flash hoods) that attach by tape, velcro strips or rubber bands to the flash head are highly-effective, and have the advantage of reducing the distance the light has to travel. Light bounced off a ceiling or wall has a longer way to go in reaching the subject than the inch or so to a bounce card.

APERTURE SETTING

There will be some loss of light due to its wider dispersal when you use bounce flash, particularly if you bounce off a high ceiling, so open the aperture an additional one-and-a-half to three stops compared with normal flash operation to compensate for this.

You should consider bracketing your exposures the first few times you use the bounce flash technique until experience gives you the confidence to predict the results.