Fill flash

Fill flash is a photographic technique used to brighten deep shadow areas, typically outdoors on sunny days, though the technique is useful any time the background is significantly brighter than the subject of the photograph. To use fill flash, the aperture and shutter speed are adjusted to correctly expose the background, and the flash is fired to lighten the foreground.

Most point and shoot cameras include a fill flash mode that forces the flash to fire, even in bright light.

Depending on your distance to the subject, you might not need the full power of the flash. If you are too close to your subject, the full power of the flash will greatly overexpose your subject. If your camera supports it, you can usually go into the camera menu and set the flash to manual and choose from various flash levels, such as 1/3, 1/2, or 1/8 power. Try setting the flash to 1/2 power and see if the natural light and the light from the flash are in balance. The trick is to get this balanced combination for a more pleasing photo that showcases the background as well as the subject.