Photography is all about light. Similar to that way in which your eyes work, we want to bounce light off the subject onto the image sensor. In a dark setting like a club or a pub, sometimes we can catch the subject with light from the surrounding room illuminating them. When that’s not possible, using a flash is the way to go. Where light comes from behind the subject, the subject can be silhouetted, leaving little light to bounce off the subject itself. If the silhouette effect isn’t what you desire, a flash or other light source from the front of the subject can solve this.

When the subject is in motion, such as playing sports or gesticulating wildly on a dance floor, using flash can ‘freeze’ the moment giving you a sharp, in focus image. However, without flash sometimes a slight blur is great to show the motion of the moment – especially if the background is focussed showing the contrast of movement. If you don’t feel like bringing a tripod with you on a night out, try steadying the shot by leaning on a table, a sober friend or a wall – whatever is handy.

However, flash seems to be often used just because it’s there. This can lead to colder looking images – try the same shots without flash for some surprising results, especially if you can get your weird mate Dave to freeze that blue-steel pose for just long enough to take an unblurred shot.