Indoor individual photos

[Wacko]

I have seen some indoor photos where the background is black but up close you can see the floor. Specifically in the hockey rink. I can tell the photographer is not using a black background, but I can't figure out how it is taken. You can see the ice and there is a nice gradient from the ice to the black background.

I'm just curious how it is done.

[JohnT]

The photographer probably underexposed the ambient light and used flash as the main light, which would light the subject and the surrounding ice with light fall-off toward the back.

[Comanche]

Yep - John is probably correct. You can try it yourself. In daylight, take a photo of somebody without flash. Then do the same with a flash and you will get fill flash. Now, go manual, set it for a faster shutter speed than the last flash shot and you will see the background is darker. Continue taking shots with progressively faster shutter speeds and eventually you will have only the subject lit by the flash, but the background totally dark - even in broad daylight.

It could also have been done with studio lights, but that's a lot of work for what the shot you saw. A lot simpler with a hot shoe flash.

Hope that helps.