Light Science & Magic

An Introduction to Photographic Lighting

Fil Hunter, Steven Biver, Paul Fuqua

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781317963578
• Edition: 5
• Topic: Art
• Subtopic: Photography

Photographic lighting is a topic that will never go out of style, no matter how sophisticated cameras and other technology get. Even with the most high-tech gear, photographers still need to put a lot of thought and vision into lighting their photographs in order to get great results. This key skill has the power to dramatically and quickly improve photographs.

Light Science and Magic provides you with a comprehensive theory of the nature and principles of light, with examples and instructions for practical application. Featuring photographs, diagrams, and step-by-step instructions, this book speaks to photographers of varying levels. It provides invaluable information on how to light the most difficult subjects, such as surfaces, metal, glass, liquids, extremes (black-on-black and white-on-white), and portraits.

This new edition includes:

• All new chapter titled "Setting Up Your New Studio"

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• A re-vamped and expanded chapter 8 now titled "Making Portraits"

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• New appendix of reliable photo gear sources

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• Over 100 new photographs and informational sidebars

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• Updated information about advances in flash equipment, LED panels and fluorescent lights

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Styles of lighting continue to change, but the nature of light will always remain the same. Once photographers understand the basic physics of lighting, they can apply that knowledge to a broad range of photographic styles.

	1
Light: the Beginning

Light: Science & Magic is a discussion, not a lecture. You bring to this discussion your own opinions about art, beauty, and aesthetics. We do not intend to change those opinions and may not even influence them very much. We will be more annoyed than flattered if reading this book causes you to make pictures that do nothing but mirror ours. For better or worse, you have to build your own pictures on your own vision.

What we do have to offer you is a set of tools. This book is about technology. Science. Brass tacks. It is information for you to use when you please, if you please, and how you please. This does not, however, mean that this book is not also about ideas, because it is.

The basic tools of lighting are principles, not hardware. Shakespeare’s tool was the Elizabethan English language, not the quill pen he used. A photographer without mastery of lighting is like a Shakespeare who could speak only the language of the people in the Globe Theatre pit. Being Shakespeare, he still might have come up with a decent play, but it certainly would have taken a lot more work and, very likely, more blind luck than most people are entitled to expect.

LIGHTING IS THE LANGUAGE OF PHOTOGRAPHY

Patterns of light convey information just as surely as do spoken words. The information that light conveys is clear and specific. It includes definite statements, such as “The bark of this tree is rough” or “This utensil is made of stainless steel, but that one is sterling.”

Lighting, like any other language, has a grammar and a vocabulary. Good photographers need to learn both. Fortunately, photographic lighting is a lot easier to master than a foreign language. This is because physics, not social whim, dictates its rules.

The tools we have included in this book are the grammar and vocabulary of light. Whatever we say about specific technique is important only to the extent that it proves the principles. Please, do not memorize the lighting diagrams in this book.

It is entirely possible to put a light in exactly the same spot as shown in one of the diagrams and still make a bad picture—especially if the subject is not identical to that in the diagram. But if you learn the principles, you may well see several other good ways to light the same subject that we never mention, and which perhaps have never even occurred to us.

WHAT ARE THE “PRINCIPLES”?

To photographers, the important principles of light are those that predict how it will behave. Some of these principles are especially powerful. You will, however, probably be surprised to find how few they are, how simple they are to learn, and how much they explain.

We discuss these key principles in detail in Chapters 2 and 3. They are the tools we use for everything else. Then in later chapters we put them to work lighting a wide range of subjects. At this point we will simply list them:

Working with Light

Figures 1.1 These four images—very different pictures—are a small sample of some of the many different ways photographers have worked with light, be it either in a studio or the outside world.

1.1 Some examples of the different photographers that have worked with light.

1. The effective size of the light source is the single most important decision in lighting a photograph. It determines what types of shadows are produced and may also affect the type of reflection.

2. Three types of reflections are possible from any surface: direct reflection, diffuse reflection, and polarized direct reflection. They determine why any surface looks the way it does.

3. Some of these reflections occur only if light strikes the surface from within a limited family of angles. After we decide what type of reflection is important, the family of angles determines where the light should or should not be.

Just think about that for a minute. If you think lighting is an art, you’re exactly right—but it’s also a technology that even a bad artist can learn to do well. These are the most important concepts in this book. If you pay close attention to them whenever they come up, you will find they will usually account for any other details you may overlook or we forget to mention.

WHY ARE THE PRINCIPLES IMPORTANT?

The three principles we have just given are statements of physical laws that have not changed since the universe began. They have nothing to do with style, taste, or fad. The timelessness of these principles is exactly what makes them so useful.

Consider, for example, how they apply to portrait style. A representative 1952 portrait does not look like most portraits made in 1852 or 2014. However, and this is the important point, a photographer who understands light could duplicate either of them.

Chapter 8 presents a number of useful approaches to lighting a portrait. But some photographers will not want to adopt those approaches, and even fewer will do so in 20 years. We do not care whether or not you use the methods of portrait lighting we chose to demonstrate.

We do, however, care very much that you understand exactly how and why we did what we did. It is the answers to those very “hows” and “whys” that will allow you to produce your own pictures your own way. Good tools do not limit creative freedom. They make it possible.

Good photographs take planning, and lighting is an essential part of that planning. For this reason, the most important part of good lighting happens before we turn on the first lights. This planning can take many days or it can happen a fraction of a second before pressing the shutter release. It does not matter when you plan or how long it takes, as long as you get the planning done. The more you accomplish with your head, the less work you have to do with your hands.

Understanding the principles we presented above enables us to decide what lights need to be where before we begin to place them. This is the important part. The rest is just fine-tuning.

HOW DID WE CHOOSE THE EXAMPLES FOR THIS BOOK?

The portrait is but one of the several basic photographic subjects we discuss. We chose each to prove something about the basic principles. We also lit the subject to show the principle, regardless of whether there might be other good ways to light the same thing. If you master the principles, you will discover the other ways without any help from us.

The above means that you should give at least some attention to every representative subject. Even if you have no interest in a particular subject, it probably relates to something you do want to photograph.

We also chose some of the subjects because they are rumored to be difficult. Such rumors are spread usually by people who lack the conceptual tools needed to deal with such subjects. This book dispels the rumors by giving you those tools.

In addition, we tried to use studio examples whenever possible. This, however, does not mean Light: Science & Magic is only about studio lighting. Far from it! Light behaves the same way everywhere, whether it is controlled by the photographer, by the building designer, or by nature. But you can set up indoor experiments like ours at any hour of any day regardless of the weather. Later, when you use the same lighting in a landscape, on a public building, or at a press conference, you will recognize it because you will have seen it before.

Finally, we chose each example to be as simple as possible. If you are learning photography, you will not have to leave the set-up in your living room or in your employer’s studio for days at a time to master it. If you teach photography, you will find that you can do any of these demonstrations in a single class session.

TO DO OR NOT TO DO?

If you are learning photography without any formal instruction, we suggest you try all of the basic examples in this book. Do not simply read about them. What happens in your head is the most important part of lighting, but the eye and the hand are still essential. Guided experience coordinates the three.

When we talk about soft shadows or polarized direct reflections, for example, you already know how they look. They happen in the world, and you see them every day. But you will know them and see them still better once you have made them happen.

If you are a student, your class assignments will keep you busy enough without any further demands from us. Your teacher may use the exercises here or invent new ones. Either way, you will learn the principles in the book because they are basic. They happen in all lighting situations.

If you are a professional photographer trying to expand your expertise, your judgment about what exercises you need is better than ours. Generally, these will be those that are least like the things you are already photographing. You may find our basic examples too simple to be an entertaining challenge. Try complicating things a bit. Add an unexpected prop, an unusual viewpoint, or a special effect to our basic example. You might as well get a striking portfolio piece out of the effort while you are at it.

If you are a teacher, you can look at this book and see that most of the exercises show at least one good, simple, easy-to-master way to light even those subjects with reputations for maximum difficulty: metal, glass, white-on-white, and black-on-black. Notice, however, that although we’ve done this in almost every case, we weren’t able to do it in absolutely every one of them.

The “invisible light” exercise in Chapter 6, for example, is pretty difficult for most beginners. Some students may also find the secondary background behind the glass ...