Reply To: April 2026 challenge topic is Using Backlighting for Subject Separation

[John]

Hi all,

Thank you, Nicholas and Elena, for thinking of these challenges. I’ve certainly taken this on board and made some effort to go out and try some backlighting over a few dives since the beginning of April. I can’t say it was all successful, but I had a good time playing around with it.

What I’ve learned so far:

1. You can never have enough D‑rings.

2. I wish I owned a pair of tech shorts with pockets.

Seriously though as part of my experimenting I tried 2 methods.

First, I extended my strobes behind the subject. What I learned from this is that I needed slightly longer arms, and I preferred using the 60 mm to the 105 mm for framing. None shared!

Secondly (and for the first time!) I used my backscatter MF2 as a remote strobe, placing it behind the subject and trying 2 ways: first by lying it on the sand, and also by using a muck stick. I found the muck stick particularly unsuitable for coral rubble, and it was much easier to place the strobe on the substrate behind the subject. I learned quickly that the remote mode is really just a gimmick – as long as the strobe is in sight of the trigger it will fire without having to adjust settings. Changing those settings was no problem.

I also experimented by using a snoot for front lighting. On the site we dive most weekends, we have an old bottle dump of World War II‑era Coke bottles. These have formed very good habitats for some fish species, in particular false cleaner fish, which are often found living inside the necks of the bottles. So I just concentrated on that one subject as a start

What I intended was to light the bottle from within, what I achieved in practice was not quite that. Part of the reason is that these bottles are so vintage that they are heavily encrusted, and I was only able to get a little light through the glass. Using too strong a strobe setting would just blow out the highlights. I also experimented with using the backscatter colour filters, the pastel ones in particular, and surprisingly I found the colours a bit too strong for my liking. Also I needed to be careful that the remote backlight itself stayed out of view!

However, given that this was an experiment and a new technique for me I was happy to give it a go, and I’m sure that over time I will hone this. A work in progress!

Sharing a sample of the learnings thus far! All Nikon D850 with 60mm:

Photo 1: 1/250 F7.1 ISO 64

Photo 2: 1/125 F18 ISO 100

Photo 3: 1/250 F25 ISO 125

Photo 4 1/1250 F10 ISO 64

Cheers

John

PS another few things learned:

Firstly – based on a discussion held in one of our coffee chats, I impulsively bought the custom backscatter snoot for the HF1 strobe (note that buying on impulse and getting something to Vanuatu is not easy!!) I have to say my experience wasn’t entirely positive for a few reasons — , it floats, making it a little more difficult to manage underwater, particularly when I was changing wet lenses and beam restrictors. Additionally, I didn’t find the light quality as good s the original backscatter snoot when used with one of Chris Miles’ adapters for the HF1 strobes (and this combo is a heck of a lot cheaper).

Secondly, after experimenting with all these new things—including colour filters, two snoots, various wet lenses, light shapers and so on—I really felt like Inspector Gadget, with bits hanging all over the place. I think that for future dives it will be a matter of focusing on a single mission, as the current approach feels overwhelming.

• This reply was modified 3 weeks, 6 days ago by  John Warmington.