Backlighting Ultra-Wide Angle Environmental Portraits | Profoto Lighting

Environmental portraits are an imperative part of your story, reminding you of the beautiful venue or location chosen to commemorate such a momentous occasion. Shooting ultra-wide angle portraits can be great for making large format prints as well, serving as a piece of art.

These types of images are not only difficult to conceptualize but also bring on the challenge of drawing the subject out of such a grand scale. Here is where exceptional lighting tools come to the rescue – the Profoto B2 allows us to photography wide landscapes while still maintaining focus on our subjects. The pop of light draws the attention of the viewer to the subjects encompassed by their vast environment.

The power and portability of the Profoto B2 makes it effortless to creating lasting imagery. The difference can be seen in the image above, from Leslie & Jonathan’s Yosemite engagement: our test shot shows the couple as just another part of the scenery, blending into the blue hues of the image. Once we added the B2 as a backlight, the couple was brought out of the scene with the warmth of the light, making them the central focus of the image.

The beauty of taking such wide angled shots is capturing the vast amount of detail available in the scene which allows us to crop in tighter to bring the focus strictly to the subject. Cropping in tight on the Yosemite image, it is clear to see that there is no loss in quality, however, the story being told is much different than its wider version. See exactly how this image was captured from start to finish in Profoto’s video here:

To view more information about our post production, please view our Lightroom Presets and our Lightroom Tutorials.

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