Synchronizing Your Flash with the Sun (Synchro-sunlight)

Filling deep shadows with artificial light has been a part of photo technique since the invention of flash powder in the 1880s. Synchronizing a handheld flash with ambient sunlight is a terrific way to soften shadows and create professional looking images. Synchro-sunlight or fill flash, two names by which it is often called, is used by many of the greatest street and travel photographers; press photographers using handheld cameras (watch those flashes go off at any press conference), and is a required skill for portrait, wedding, and fashion photographers.

synchronize-main The concept is quite simple: use your flash to illuminate the subject and use sunlight to illuminate the background.

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