The Natural Light Portrait Book

Shooting on Cloudy Days

Don’t cancel the shoot if it’s a cloudy day—those clouds act like a natural diffuser, like nature’s giant softbox, so you won’t have to deal with harsh sunlight and all that entails. In fact, many portrait pros prefer to shoot on cloudy days, but just keep in mind that while the sunlight won’t be harsh, it may not be very directional either. So, the light will be kind of boring, depending on how cloudy it is. (Note: Here we were still able to get some shadows on one side of our subject’s face, which is ideal, but not always possible. You can see from the behind-the-scenes shot that we are right out in the middle of the ...