Note: Photographers’ Friday is a weekly blog series directed toward professional photographers, and in some instances, serious amateur photographers. All Photographers’ Friday blog posts will assume that readers have a basic working knowledge of digital SLR cameras, but if you’re left with questions or don’t understand any of the information, don’t hesitate to ask. We love e-mails!

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It’s one of the simplest techniques that help achieve lovely portraits: Find something light colored, and position your subject so the light bouncing off that light-colored object reflects onto your subject, brightening your subject’s face.

You can use almost anything — a white or tan or light gray wall; a sidewalk; your bride’s gown; a gravel driveway or a sandy beach. When we shot Danyelle’s portraits with her bridesmaids, we had a lovely white tiled patio. See how much of a glow the girls have on their faces because of the light bouncing up from below?

Why do we love natural reflectors? Because they help us get our pictures perfect in-camera, which means less time tinkering with images on our computer afterward. While we absolutely love shooting in fresh grass or surrounded by lush foliage, sometimes the excess of greenness means we have to adjust our subjects’ skin tones in post processing, so that they don’t look green, too. The same goes for shooting in any vividly colored space — next to red bricks or in a room with bright walls, for example. When the light bounces off a light, neutral colored surface, the light that washes over our subject is clear and neutral, too. So we look for it whenever we can.

Sound easy? It is! I hope it will work as well for you as it does for us!

~ Laura