Research into Lighting - HOALIE

Lighting Types

Lighting is a very important aspect for shaping meaning in films. The lighting technicians in a film crew have the task of creating lighting to suit the mood and atmosphere of each scene in a film. The type of lighting can greatly affect the atmosphere that is trying to be created. There are several kinds of lighting situations. You could have diffuse, non-directional lighting, for example, the light on an overcast day. Another type of lighting is lighting from one direction. A common example of this is the rays from the sun. As the sun is so far away, it can be treated as a point source of light, which is what gives it such a strong directional quality.

Directional light can be split into 3 rough types. These are frontlighting, sidelighting and backlighting. As hinted by the names, frontlighting refers to light coming generally from in front of the subject, while sidelighting is when light comes from the left or right of the subject, and backlighting is where light hits the subject from behind, and goes relatively directly towards the camera. They are not fixed angles; you can have different proportions of two of these happening at the same time.

Frontlighting

This is one of the easier lighting situations to work with. When you have light coming from in front of the subject, they are lit up quite evenly, and the contrast is relatively low. This allows for decent-looking shots from lower quality cameras, where the dynamic range may not be that great. Frontlighting should be quite easy to meter for. Automatic camera modes should be able to handle this situation correctly. One disadvantage of this lighting scenario is that the subject is facing the light, which can cause squinting.

Pros:

• Provides the most information to the camera by lighting the entire scene.
• Easiest type of light to deal with photographically because there are fewer shadows to confuse the camera's light meter.

Cons:

• Can be a bit boring—pictures lack volume and depth.
• Textures and details are minimized. Scenes appear flat with few shadows.
• Flash pictures may result in very bright subject areas and very dark backgrounds, if the background is beyond flash range.

Sidelighting

You have sidelighting if the light is coming primarily from the left or right of the subject. If the difference in illumination between the left and right sides is large, then the side in shadow may look a lot darker than how you see it in real life. This is to do with the limited dynamic range of the camera; it cannot capture details in both the bright and dark areas if the difference in brightness is too large. However, the effect you get is a dramatic looking picture.

Pros:

• Can separate the subject from the background.
• Conveys depth, as in a landscape at sunset.
• Conveys texture, as in a weathered tree, fence, or plowed field.

Cons:

• May be too severe for some subjects, creating some areas that are too bright, and some that are too dark. (See Fill flash to compensate.)

Backlighting

This lighting type is one of the most challenging ones to capture correctly, but is potentially the most beautiful. When you have light coming from behind the subject, you have a very large difference between the brightness levels of the subject and background. If you don't reduce this contrast by adding in light from the front, you'll lose detail in one of them.

Losing detail in the subject will result in a silhouette picture, where the subject becomes a block of dark solid colour. Sacrificing detail in the background is done by overexposing it too keep the subject at a good exposure. This can introduce effects like lens flare and light bleed, which can add to the image if you're trying to convey a warm atmosphere.

Pros:

• Simplifies a complicated scene by emphasizing the subject, as in a silhouette.
• Provides a flattering halo of light in portraits.
• Adds strong shadows in landscapes.

Cons:

• Lack of detail in a dark subject.
• Causes lens flare resulting in low contrast and strange light spots across the picture.
• Using exposure compensation to overcome backlighting results in too-bright background.

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