Guide to Photography Lighting

Lighting Guide

Knowing how to work with different light sources and lighting setups is one of the biggest challenges of photography. That’s why we put together this guide to photography lighting: to give you a practical place to start.

In it, we’ll look at how to choose the right lighting – be it natural or artificial light – to suit your photography.

By the end of the guide, you’ll be ready to start shooting with different types of light in many different situations. So, let’s get started.

6 Basics of Photography Lighting

The word photography means “drawing with light”.  So, we’ll take a quick look at some lighting basics before answering the question, “What is the best lighting for photography?”.

1. Start with natural light before adding flash

Natural light – provided by the sun and moon – is constantly changing with the time of day and the weather.

So, explore the effect of light – go out and shoot at different times of the day, see how this alters the images you create. How do the tones in the image change?

You may find in certain situations that you need the addition of artificial light, and the most obvious tool for the photographer is the camera flash. Simply put, you can use it to provide a good exposure when conditions are too dark.

On the downside, a direct flash is often too much and burns out details. To mitigate this, you can bounce the flash off another surface like a wall or ceiling.

2. The importance of lighting position

A single light or flash can help show the effects of directional lighting. Choose some simple objects – fruit, china bowls – and set up your light source to one side of your subject. Then move it around the subject and observe how the highlights and shadows change shape.

Shadows can increase the three-dimensional look and can make an image a lot more dramatic. If you’re shooting a person, check out what happens to the detailing and tones on the face when you move your light source into a different position.

Tip: Convert your image to black and white to see the tones more clearly and then compare your results with full-colour images of the same subject.

3. Soft Light vs Hard Light

Photography lighting can be ‘soft’ or ‘hard’. Hard light will make the image more contrasty – reducing the midtones.

Soft light will decrease the contrast level and increase the range of midtones giving a cosy, reflective feel.

4. Reflectors and Diffusers

A white surface reflects light back to the light source; a black surface absorbs light.

Reflectors are widely used – indoors and outdoors – to reflect light back onto a subject to reveal more detail or balance the contrast across an image. Reflectors can be all different colors – to learn more about each type, see our guide: what are reflectors used for in photography?

Diffusers are used over a light source (such as a flash, strobe or video light) to spread the beam more evenly and reduce its intensity.

They’re also useful when you’re trying to light glass and avoid reflections.

5. Color Temperature and White Balance

All light has colour – even ordinary daylight. Think of the “golden hour” just before sunrise when the light is infused with yellowy-orange hues.

Colour temperature is measured in degrees Kelvin or K. These range from Shade at 7500K (blue and cool) through Daylight (about 5500K) to moonlight, which is much whiter at 4120K, on to candles at 2500k (red and warm).

Artificial lights have distinctive colours – LEDs often cast a blue light, but standard house bulbs are warmer. Fluorescent lamps at 4500K and halogen lights are yellower, 3,000K.

The white balance control in your camera lets you adjust the settings so that white objects are white and the other colours in view will be correctly balanced to it. There are automatic white balance settings that provide standard choices for different types of lighting.

Post-processing programs such as Lightroom and Photoshop have settings to let you adjust the white balance in an image to compensate for unwanted colour casts – learn more in our guide.

6. Strobes

Strobes are another common light source, and a powerful alternative to flash. They can be linked to a remote trigger system on the camera, so they act as more powerful off-camera flashes.

Strobes have very quick recycle times and produce a very quick, strong burst of light.

Light Functions

Here are some of the most popular light functions that can be used indoors or outdoors, in the studio or on location:

  • Key Light – The main light trained on the subject to create highlight and shadow.
  • Fill Light – A fill light literally ‘fills’ in dark areas with light.
  • Backlight – This is a light set up behind a subject to help isolate the subject from its background. It’s often placed so the subject shields it from the view of the camera. It’s often considered the best lighting setup for for portraits to highlight hairstyles.
  • Rim Light – This is when a backlight is set up close to the subject and, with careful placing, produces a line of highlight around the edge of the subject. Very dramatic and eye-catching!

8 Popular Photography Lighting Techniques

Here we look at some popular photography lighting techniques that you can easily try out and get to grips with in your own photography.

1. High Key Lighting

High key light example white cat

Credit: Emily Hopper

A high key style uses two or more light sources to create a brightly lit image, with little or no visible shadows. It’s frequently used in commercial photography to create bright, airy images that still retain a lot of detail.

2. Three-point lighting

three-point-lighting-featured

Three-point lighting uses a key light, a fill light and a backlight. This gives the photographer a lot of control in terms of light and shadow.

3. Broad and Short lighting

broad-lighting

Credit: Ales Dusa

Used in portraiture. Broad lighting is when you light the side of the face nearest the camera. Short lighting is illuminating the side of the face furthest from the camera.

4. Rim light

Bottle with illuminated outline

Credit: Cottonbro

Rim light is a type of backlighting. You can create it with an artificial light source or with natural light like the sun (particularly at sunset).

With this setup, the edges of your subject are lit up by the backlight – typically, this leaves hairs and the very edge of your subject illuminated. It helps separate your subject from the background and is very effective.

5. Split Lighting

Woman lying down with face half in shadow

Split lighting is used in portraiture with the light source side-on to achieve a perfect half-lit, half-shadow effect on a face.

6. Backlighting

backlighting-photography-featured

Backlighting is when you light up a subject from behind.  It can be used to create silhouettes or semi silhouettes. If you introduce a fill light, you can overcome silhouetting.

7. Rembrandt Lighting

Shadowy portrait of man in black and white

Credit: Hollie Mateer

Rembrandt lighting is a portrait lighting technique. Named after the great painter, it requires a side key light positioned to create a small triangle of light under the eye on the cheekbone on the further side of the face.

8. Butterfly lighting

Credit: Ziphaus

For a butterfly light effect, you place your light in front and shining down onto the face. This creates a distinctive ‘butterfly’ shadow under the subject’s nose and helps to emphasise facial features such as cheekbones.

Original article on Shotkit