Thinking about Light

You will quickly improve your ability to create and recreate lighting effects you like if first you take time to study natural light.

Hard Light

• The sun is the source of all daylight—sun in a clear sky casts one hard shadow opposite each object it hits.
• The angle and length of that shadow depends on the angle of the sun to the earth, as well as to the subject.
• When the sun is overhead, shadows are short; when it is low, shadows are long..
• When the sun hits the side of a subject, it reveals texture.
• Light that casts a hard shadow is technically known as “spectral” light.
• Hard light can be dramatic in effect, or it can be harsh, ugly.
• Any photo light with a metal reflector mimics the look of the sun in a clear sky, causing a hard shadow to fall behind whatever it hits.
• 
  
• The angle, shape, size, and finish of metal reflectors behind lights, when aimed directly at a subject, all influence the “look” of the light.
• A “bare bulb”—a photo lamp, flash, or strobe tube without a reflector—casts a soft shadow similar to the sun through thin clouds or mist.

Soft Light

• The sun filtered through fog or cloud casts soft shadows or almost no shadows.
• Soft light, called “diffused” light, is easy to use, flattering to most subjects.
• Totally shadowless light can be flattering, or dull or drab, like the light of a heavily overcast day.
• The sun, when it “bounces” (or reflects) from a white wall onto a nearby subject in shadow creates a warm, flattering, almost shadowless effect.
• Photographic light can also be softened by “bouncing”—reflecting—it.
• Bounced photographic light is always soft and is usually flattering to people.
• Many accessories are made that diffuse and/or bounce photo lights—white umbrellas and collapsible white/silver reflectors are the most useful.