PicsArt Monthly January 2014 Issue | Page 29

Expose your image properly for the lens flare @semblance As mentioned above, shooting straight into the sun, though necessary for lens flare, can in fact horribly overexpose your image and white out most of your picture. However, one of the most popular uses of lens flares these days is to allow the rest of the photo to bathe in an ethereal, slightly overexposed light balance. If this is your vision, then underexposing your image will be just as deadly. So what to do? It’s important to shoot in manual for this sort of shots, as auto modes will leave a lot of your image looking too dark. For a diffused flare, you should use a wide aperture, keep the ISO as low as possible, then play around with the shutter speed until your desired effect is achieved. Bracketing can also help you here, so that you can shoot several shots at different shutter speeds, just in case. PicsArt Monthly | 29