Creating a starburst effect around your subject is another popular method of utilizing the sun within your picture. By using a wide-angle lens, you can get a natural star effect when shooting directly into the sun. To get this effect, you must use a small aperture—f/11 or higher—for a well-defined starburst. Another way to get this effect is by adding a star, cross-screen, or scrim filter in front of your lens. This allows you to control and emphasize the starburst effect. Filter manufacturers now offer varying types of star filters that produce 4, 6, 8, or more points of light. While looking at the scene through the viewfinder, turn the filter until you get the star effect you want in your image. If you want to render detail in your subject when shooting into the sun, you can use any reflective surface as a natural fill to reflect light back onto your subject. You can provide an alternative to the harshness of back light and highlight the front of your subject. Water or sand can be used as natural fills. Many professional photographers carry a large Fome-Cor board, commercial reflector, or other reflective surfaces that can be held in front of the subject by an assistant who’s out of the picture. Even when the sun isn’t part of your composition, it can have a significant effect on your image. Although lens flare can sometimes be a problem, it can also be used for artistic effect, as in this photo. Indirect Sunlight Even if the sun is not directly part of your composition, it can have a powerful effect on your image. One way to do this is to use the sun’s reflection. This can be accomplished by shifting the angle of the picture until the sun reflects off a shiny surface, such as water. You can utilize many of the same techniques with reflective light as when the sun is actually in the frame. For example, you can create a star effect on the sun and/or the reflection by using a wide-angle lens and a small f-stop, like f/11 or f/16. One of the biggest challenges you’ll face when placing the sun behind your subject is lens flare. This occurs when unwanted stray light strikes the surface of the lens. The sun may not even be in the picture, but the effect can ruin an image. The most common result is light, aperture-shaped patterns in your photos. There may also be a loss of contrast, causing foggy or bleached-out looking images. When shooting in bright sunlight with the sun behind or to one side of the subject, you should always use a lens shade to keep stray light from entering the lens. An alternative is to use your hand or a piece of cardboard to shade your lens. As midday sunlight is bright, it’s best to use slow film. My personal choice is Kodachrome 64, but I have created fine images with Kodak Elite Chrome 100 or Fujichrome Provia 100F. As the sun sinks lower in the sky, you may want to use faster film to capture the quickly changing light conditions. Kodak Ektachrome E200 can provide that extra stop you may need to capture that blazing orange ball as it sinks into the horizon. Any time you photograph a backlit subject, expect to take many pictures. By exposing a lot of film, you’ll have a better chance of capturing the image you want. Bracket exposures by using different f-stops and shutter speeds. A common standard exposure range is from two f-stops above the proper exposure to two f-stops below in 1¼2-stop increments. By taking many pictures while changing the exposure, your chances of getting a properly exposed picture increase. Don’t be surprised if you get some unexpected results. By shooting a range of exposures, you’ll get a variety of effects and images that can sometimes be better than your original concept. I once discovered one of my favorite pictures while editing a set of slides. The sun provided an additional reflection that I didn’t see during the original shoot of a young couple in front of the setting sun. By adding illumination to your image from the most powerful light source known to man, you can improve the composition of your photographs. The sun often creates a perfect counterbalance to your main subject. By using these methods, you can turn a simple photograph into a work of art.