Golden hour is great and all, but if you put your camera away as soon as the sun dips below the horizon you are missing out on some of the most delicious light and beautifully colored skies that make up blue hour. 

Shooting during golden hour is often well within photographer’s comfort zones. But shooting during blue hour takes different technique and thinking in how to creatively use the light that’s left in the sky. So to help soften that learning curve, here are three of my favorite tips for shooting during blue hour: 

1. FRONT LIGHT YOUR PHOTOS 

During golden hour, more often than not, most photographers will back light or side light their images for those dreamy golden hues. But once the sun drops below the horizon those colors tend to get pretty dark if they’re backlit. So instead, turn your clients to face the area of the sky where the sun just was! This technically front lights your images with some perfectly diffused sunlight. 

2. EXPOSE FOR THE SKY

Do not, I repeat, do NOT increase your ISO or lower your shutter speed so that your clients stay properly exposed. If you blow out your highlights you risk losing color data in the sky of your images. Blue hour skies have the most beautiful color gradients, don’t miss out on that because you’re too worried about your subjects! Keep your ISO low and make sure the colors of the sky are showing up in your images straight out of camera. You can always bring your clients exposure up in post, but you can’t bring back those sky colors! 

3. INCLUDE THE MOON

If you have a moon in your sky, use it! We had a new moon on the evening of this session so no cool moon shots in this gallery; but if you’ve got any other phase of the moon, make sure it’s in your shots! It can be really fun to use your subjects to frame the moon, get the moon in focus and your subjects out of focus or to bring detail to your blue hour sky!