jayhan
09-26-2007, 10:24 AM
From time to time, I'll try to post up some lighting tip which I've learned over the last couple of months, to share it with you guys. Please bear in mind that I'm no pro, so some technical terms which I use would mean bollocks to many of the pros out there :P The descriptive ways I use would be good for myself only, in my quest to uderstand lighting for photography more.
Today, I'm gonna talk about light quality. This would be as what we commonly describe as : HARD LIGHT or SOFT LIGHT.
There are many ways which we can achieve the light quality which we want. Some say that to achieve soft light, diffusing it or bouncing a flash will achieve this. While it is true, what I'm gonna explain today is based on the apparent light source's size.
I think it is safe to say and relate, that:
1. A big source of lighting, relative to the subject will produce a soft light.
2. Vice versa, a small source of lighting will be harsh on the subject.
An example of this would be the common technique of bouncing flash off on a white wall when shooting a portrait. What this technique do, is that it converts the small source of light (flash head, in terms of the effective lit area), to a big and huge source of light - the white wall. This is relatively compared to the human as the subject of course. Same goes to an umbrella which also serve to enlarge the source of light to lit up a model's face.
Another example of this would be based on what we all commonly say : "Direct flash causes harsh shadows". I would try to differ this by pointing out that, if I were to use a 580EX on a small toy car model, and put the flash just about 2" away from the car - shoot a macro of it. The resulted image would give a rather pleasing lighting and shadows. That's because the subject sees the lighting source as a big one.
I dont have examples of this yet, and hopefully this tip would help some of you guys out there understand lighting a lil bit better. While I may be not 100% perfect in my decription, all form of discussion over this is welcomed. :) Better still, why dont you try out the examples I decribed above and share the results here. :)
Have fun trying!
Today, I'm gonna talk about light quality. This would be as what we commonly describe as : HARD LIGHT or SOFT LIGHT.
There are many ways which we can achieve the light quality which we want. Some say that to achieve soft light, diffusing it or bouncing a flash will achieve this. While it is true, what I'm gonna explain today is based on the apparent light source's size.
I think it is safe to say and relate, that:
1. A big source of lighting, relative to the subject will produce a soft light.
2. Vice versa, a small source of lighting will be harsh on the subject.
An example of this would be the common technique of bouncing flash off on a white wall when shooting a portrait. What this technique do, is that it converts the small source of light (flash head, in terms of the effective lit area), to a big and huge source of light - the white wall. This is relatively compared to the human as the subject of course. Same goes to an umbrella which also serve to enlarge the source of light to lit up a model's face.
Another example of this would be based on what we all commonly say : "Direct flash causes harsh shadows". I would try to differ this by pointing out that, if I were to use a 580EX on a small toy car model, and put the flash just about 2" away from the car - shoot a macro of it. The resulted image would give a rather pleasing lighting and shadows. That's because the subject sees the lighting source as a big one.
I dont have examples of this yet, and hopefully this tip would help some of you guys out there understand lighting a lil bit better. While I may be not 100% perfect in my decription, all form of discussion over this is welcomed. :) Better still, why dont you try out the examples I decribed above and share the results here. :)
Have fun trying!