Lighting

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Lighting

• Creating Atmosphere
• Quality of Light
• Direction of Light
• Subject Contrast
• Exposure Compensation
• Depth of Field
• Studio Lighting

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Introduction

• The Quality and Direction of Light can change
  character and mood
• There are limitations to the image sensor to
  record contrast
• Photography
• Greek photolight, graphwriting
• The light might become the subject (patterns,
  shadows, reflections)

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Lighting

• Creating Atmosphere

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Creating Atmosphere

• The best way to produce atmosphere
• Use directional light from the side and/or from
  behind the subject
• Most amateurs do not do this
• Outside with the sun or use a flash
• Hard to control the light source
• For color this is ok
• But for BW it makes for a dull picture- why?

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Creating Atmosphere

• Learn to control light and use it creatively
• Ask yourself these 3 questions
• What type or quality of light is being used?
• Where is it coming from?
• What effect does this light have upon the
  subject? background?

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Lighting

• Quality of Light

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Quality of Light

• Hard Quality
• Source Light bulb or sun
• Shadows are dark and have well-defined edges
• Soft Quality
• Source large and diffused, or reflected light
• Shadows are less dark and edges are not defined

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Quality of Light

• The smaller the light, the harder the light
  appears
• Then larger the light source, the softer the
  light appears

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Lighting

• Direction of Light

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Direction of Light

• Decides where the shadows will fall
• Relative to subject light may be
• High, low, to one side, in front of or behind the
  subject
• May be more than one source
• Directly on the subject
• Reflected onto the subject
• Second source-flash

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Lighting

• Subject Contrast

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Subject Contrast

• Degree of difference between the lightest and
  darkest tones
• Lighting helps give contrast
• Contrast gives the subject
• Dimension
• Shape
• Form

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Subject Contrast

• High contrast
• dark and light tones dominate over midtones
• highest contrast-two tones black and white
• Low contrast
• Mid-tones dominate
• Few black and white

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Exposure

• Exposure is how much light gets to the sensor or
  film
• Controlled by
• Aperture
• Shutter speed

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Subject Contrast

• Limitations of Cameras
• The eye can register detail in a range of tones
• Digital image sensors cannot
• Sensors only see a small range of tones
• Increasing exposure will reveal more detail in
  shadows and dark tones (more light)
• Decreasing exposure will reveal more detail in
  the highlights and bright tones (less light)
• If you want shadow detail on bright day, you
  will have to increase the exposure one stop to
  avoid underexposure of your subject and to get
  detail

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Exposure Compensation

• Light meter
• A meter that measures the light, making an
  average between the light and dark tones you have
  framed
• Most digital cameras have this built in
• Meters are accurate when there is an even
  distribution of tones

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Lighting

• Exposure Compensation

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Exposure Compensation

• Light meter
• Compensation is needed
• When there is a dominate dark or light it throws
  off the reading
• Then you need to adjust the exposure
• Classic example
• Person standing in front of snowy mountains
• Person dark mountains light
• What do you do?

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Exposure Compensation

• Light meter
• Compensation is needed
• Subject is in front of bright window
• Camera will indicate an exposure setting that
  will reduce the light to the sensor
• By increasing the exposure setting by one stop
  you overexpose the light, but properly expose the
  subject
• Or move closer to subject and set exposure, move
  back and take the picture with the setting
• Or point away from the bright light, set the
  exposure, and reposition the camera

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Lighting

• Depth of Field

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Depth of Field

• The amount of light can be varied by
• Shutter speed- the amount of time the shutter
  stays open for
• Aperture- the size of the hole the light comes
  thru (f-stop)
• Depth of field
• Changing the aperture can change the appearance
  of the picture from the nearest point to the
  farthest

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Aperture
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Depth of Field
F4
F8
F16
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Depth of Field

• Depth of field
• The widest aperture (f2,f 4) give the least depth
  of field
• The smallest aperture (f11, f16) give the most
  depth of field

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Depth of Field

• Depth of field
• Example
• Look at your hand at arms length
• It is in focus, the wall is not
• Look at the far wall
• Your hand goes out of focus
• Shallow depth of field
• Maximum depth of field
• Both hand and wall in focus (f22)

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Depth of Field

• Before you take a picture
• The camera is at its widest aperture to get light
  to viewfinder and for easy focusing
• When you depress the shutter the aperture goes
  where you set it (f-stop)

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Lighting

• Studio Lighting

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Basic Studio Lighting

• Main light source
• Positioned as desired
• Reflector- bounces main light from the main light
  back to subject
• Fill- weaker light positioned by the camera
• Diffusion- hard source softened by reflection or
  tracing paper placed in front of the light
• Effects light
• Shone on to the background
• Shone on back of subject

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Studio Lighting
Backdrop
Effects Light
Subject
Main Light
Reflector
Camera
Fill Light
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Lighting

• Creating Atmosphere
• Quality of Light
• Direction of Light
• Subject Contrast
• Exposure Compensation
• Depth of Field
• Studio Lighting

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Introduction

• The Color Wheel
• Primary Colors
• Red, blue, yellow
• Secondary Colors
• Orange, purple, green
• Tertiary colors
• Red-purple, red-orange, etc.
• Mixed with the colors beside it

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Primary Colors
Fill in Primary Colors
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Secondary Colors
Fill in Secondary Colors
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Tertiary Colors
Outline Tertiary Colors
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Introduction

• The Color Wheel
• Contrasting colors
• Complementary
• Red-green
• Blue-orange
• Purple-yellow

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Contrasting Colors
Opposite on the color wheel
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Introduction

• The Color Wheel
• Warm or Cool
• Warm red, orange, yellow
• Cool purple, blue, green

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Warm or Cool
Cool
Warm
Fill in Warm and Cool Colors
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Color in Composition

• Adds to the picture
• Can help tell a story
• Too much of a good thing
• Saturated colors
• Contrasting colors

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Color in Mood

• Subtle colors draw you in
• Red- energy, excitement
• Blue- cool and calm
• Lack of color
• Add to composition
• Red boat in mist
• Child in snowy field

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Shape

• One or more shapes than dominate
• Shapes that complement

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Pattern

• Must be more than 1 object
• Repeating patterns of line, shape or color
• Variation of shape or size
• Contrasting colors
• Nature or Man Made

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Texture

• 1 or more objects
• Repeating patterns
• Lines straight, diagonal, free
• Shapes one or more