Use high-speed sync

WANT TO SHOOT IN SUNNY CONDITIONS WITH A FLASH BUT STILL HAVE LOVELY BLURRED BACKGROUNDS? HERE’S HOW

When shooting flash-lit portraits in sunlight it can be tricky to blur backgrounds. The problem lies in our shutter speed, which, when coupled with a flash, is usually restricted to a max flash sync speed of 1/200 or 1/250 sec. If we use the ‘Sunny f/16’ rule (see previous page), then with a shutter speed of 1/200 sec, even if we drop ISO to 100 we could only open our aperture up to f/11, which isn’t wide enough for a shallow DOF. The solution is to use a flash capable of high speed sync. This pulses the flash, enabling higher shutter speeds and wider apertures (1/4000 sec with aperture f/2.5 in the larger shot here).