How to Shoot Backlit Swimwear Photos During Golden Hour: Swimsuit Tutorial from Anita Sadowska

Pro swimwear photographer Anita Sadowska is back with another great tutorial. In the below video, she tackles the problem of what do you do when you have the right natural light when photographing a swimsuit model, but it’s in the wrong place.

“Those of you who are familiar with my channel know that I do love shooting in natural light in the golden hour,” Sadowska says. “I find it’s one of the most flattering times of the day to shoot swimwear. It gives you really beautiful highlights and really soft shadows and, in general, it’s just really beautiful light to work with. As you guys also know I generally shoot in the direct sunlight, but this time I decided to be a bit different. Because the sun was setting we were getting the beautiful golden highlight behind her which I thought was really beautiful.”

There’s no arguing with that but the shot presented a tricky problem. How do you get sensual skintones when the model is bathed, largely, in shadows? The answer, according to Sadowska, is to spray a thin layer of olive oil on her skin, which creates a glow when photographed.

“It’s going to give you a lovely sheen on the body,” she explains. “It’s going to make the tan look darker and deeper because the model’s going to be facing away from the sun, so it’s going to add some more definition and darkness to the tan which I think is quite nice.”

Check out the video below where Sadowska explains more of her swimwear photography tricks and then go visit her YouTube channel for more great tutorials. Here are three more that we spotlighted recently.

Here’s How to Do Full Body Retouching of Swimsuit Photos Using Photoshop (Video Tutorial)

How to Use Light and Location to Capture Stunning Swimsuit Photos (VIDEO)

5 Quick Tips for Shooting Sensual Swimwear Photos at the Beach (VIDEO)

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