Golden Hour Photography Guide

The time tells you when to be ready. The angle tells you where to stand. Before a shoot, check where the sun will come from at the start, middle and end of the window.

For portraits, I like starting with backlight or side light. For buildings, I check which face will catch the light. For landscapes, I look for texture that the low sun can rake across.

Start with the clean frame while the light is still easy. Get the simple portrait, the wide landscape, the obvious composition. Once you have it, then chase flare, silhouettes, reflections or tighter details.

This keeps the session from turning into a panic. Golden hour feels long until it suddenly is not.

If the sun is in or near the frame, watch highlights closely. It is usually better to hold detail in the bright areas and lift shadows later.

For portraits, expose for the face and let the background go bright if the photo can handle it. For silhouettes, do the opposite: expose for the sky and let the subject become shape.

The minutes after sunset can be excellent. The contrast drops, color can stay in the sky, and people stop squinting. If you have already done the warm directional shots, keep working into blue hour.

That handoff from warm to cool is where a lot of travel sets get their range.