Make great photos 02: Lighting

Arguably, lighting should have come first in the “Make a great photo” series. Because after all, without light, photography doesn’t exist. I put it second because, also arguably, what you see is more important than how it’s lit. Lighting is very important, nonetheless, so here are a few considerations for dialing in your lighting to make sure your subject looks its best.

1. Use The Sun! …If You Can

   The sun is the world’s “key” light (the term for the primary light on a subject), and it does a great job of it. In almost every scenario, natural light is going to look great on your subject. This comes back to the fact that humans have been seeing things lit by the sun for as long as we’ve existed, and because of that, it just looks right. There are, however, optimal ways to utilize the sun, and times of day to avoid using sunlight. Here are a few of those.

   • DO put the sun in front of your subject, off to one side by 45º. This has proven to be a good look on people, as it lights the face well with nice shadows falling off on one side while avoiding the squint of staring straight into the sun.

   • DO backlight your subject with the sun if you want to get a cool backlit sunburst / silhouette kind of look, but be sure to expose your shot so the subject is dark! Phones will automatically try to boost the exposure to get detail out of your subject (if that’s what you tapped on), and that will only make your subject look grainy and the background look properly exposed. Basically, it’ll make it look like you don’t know what you’re doing, and we both know that’s not true because you’re reading this blog. Obvi.

   • Ideally DON’T shoot your subject at high noon. When the sun is highest in the sky it creates harsh downward shadows on the face that just don’t look that awesome. If you can, aim to do your shooting in the first 2-3 hours after sunrise, and the last hour or two before sunset (“Golden Hour”). These times produce delicious golden light (hence the name) that make damn near anything you want to photograph look a-may-zing. If you can’t shoot at those times, try to put your subject in the shade, or find a way to diffuse, bounce, or otherwise “modify” the light so it’s less harsh and direct. More on those terms later down the page…

2. Modify the light

   Light has many attributes that, when adjusted intentionally, can create very nice looks on a subject.

   1. Color temperature is a measurement of warmth or coolness of light. It’s measured in Kelvin and goes from the warmest (Tungsten) at 3200 Kelvin (or K), to the coldest (Daylight) at about 5600K. Your household lightbulbs will be measured in this temperature scale, which you will find printed on the box, and typically on the bulb itself. Many of us (myself included) find it the most comfortable to light our homes with warmer light. It’s just cozy and easier on the eyes. However, daylight bulbs can make a space feel clean, modern, and psychologically even a bit brighter than their warmer counterparts. Whichever you choose, just do yourself and your photography a favor and keep the light on your subject consistent. The reason is because cameras with auto white balance (like phones), can get confused when you have a warm light and a cold light falling on a subject, or even within the same scene. This causes unintended tints to appear in your shot that don’t look very good. More advanced photo apps can make the white balance a setting that you can control, but in the native iPhone camera app, you can’t. So for this reason, try to keep the color temperature consistent in your scene by controlling the bulbs you put in your fixtures.

   2. Use Diffusion! Diffusion is a way of softening and spreading light out over a subject. This is done by passing the light through a translucent medium like lightweight fabric, tissue paper, plastic, etc. A great way of achieving this effect is to go on Amazon and buy a few paper China Ball lanterns. You can either put these on existing lamps or grab a couple of plug-in light sockets and hang these strategically from the ceiling around your set. These will effectively act like mini suns and do an excellent job of illuminating faces for very little upfront cost.

   3. You can also “bounce” light off of an opaque, flat surface to transfer light coming from one direction on to the opposite, more shaded side. The bigger surface the more light you’ll bounce. To accomplish this, you can buy one of these purpose-built diffusers from Fotodiox or even just grab a piece of poster board from the craft store. Most often this material should be white to avoid bouncing colors on your subject. However, if done intentionally, adding color can be a really cool effect if it serves your content and message, so play around and have some fun with it if it suits your situation.

3. Add Practicals

   While lighting the primary subject is by far the most important, it is also nice to add light to dark corners of the room or scene where the subject appears. These lights that appear in the frame are called “practicals” in the film business. Really, they exist to add interest to your scene and allow the viewer to see the whole scene. Of course, this means the scene needs to be interesting and clean, and I will get into the particulars of that in another post. In general though, you want to balance the scene by putting these practicals strategically around the subject to frame the subject and maybe even bounce a little hair or rim light off of the top or dark side of the subject’s head.