Introduction to Light Flashcards
light has several different properties, these include?
- quantity
- colour
- direction
- quality
what is the quality of light?
the amount of light that is measured and is measured by a light meter.
what is colour of light?
the colour or ‘hue’ of the light
what is the changes of colour often referred to?
colour temper or colour balance of daylight.
cameras pick up the colour difference
how do you detect the colour balance of daylight?
look at the colour of any shadows.
light direction
sun is normally above the eye-line, because of this what happens?
light normally comes from above the subject.
light direction
what happens when the light direction if it is below the subject?
gives a very unnatural appearance, commonly known as horror lighting.
quality of light
what does soft light produce?
gentle mid-tone shadows of low contrast.
what does soft light project?
low contrast and low colour saturation
what is soft light traditionally used to photograph?
women to emphasise their soft nature.
what does hard light produce?
crisp dark shadow with high contrast.
what does hard light project?
high contrast and high colour saturation
what is hard light traditionally used to photograph?
men to emphasise their power and masculinity.
what is a histogram?
a graphical representation of the tonal range in your image. the left side of the graph represents the blacks or shadow, the right side represents the highlights or bright areas and the middle represents the mid-tones (middle or grey)
what does height of the peaks of the graph?
represents the number of pixels of a particular tone
each tone from 0-255
what is clipping?
spike up the left or right edge of the histograms indicate “clipping” of that tone nd loss of detail in that area are often unrecoverable especially in highlights
in what cases may it not be possible to keep the graph within the acceptable range?
scenes with great contrast such as she thought, bright sunlight and deep shadows and in all the those cases, you will not be able to keep from clipping the black or white or both
what does histograms tell us about exposure?
an image is well exposed if it reaches fully from edge to edge without a gap on one side of the graph, and it isn’t heavily going up one side or the other. the graph should have a nice arch in the centre and just touch left and right edges of the histogram.
what is tonal range?
the range of tones between the lightest and darkest areas of an image.
- an image with a wide tonal range will have both very dark and very light elements within the photograph.
- an image with a narrow tonal range will be more limited in it tonal scope to mid ranges (shades of grey)
how is high let photography identified?
by bright lighting that greatly reduces and sometimes shadow
what’s the features of dynamic range?
predominantly toward the right side of a histogram
creatively creates a mood that is lighthearted, ethereal or beautiful
when is high key photography typically used?
in high fashion, product or studio produced images. distracting elements in the background get eliminated and typically high key images contain on the main subject. many times the background is entirely white and images are often minimalist
what is monochrome high key?
more prevalent and when there is colour used it is typically subdued or used as an accent
what kind of environment does producing high key images make easy?
where you have full control of lightning
what is the comparison of high key to low key lighting?
high key image, where most of the tones are above (lighter than) 50% grey, a low key portrait has tones that are mostly under (darker than) 50%
what is low key light creatively?
repairing the light, airy feel with a more moody and dramatic look
what is low key lighting in terms of histogram?
most of the introduction is bunched on the left hand side that’s not only to say that your undercoating the subject to get this look
to get low key lighting in portraiture and landscape with us essential?
- portraiture - using dark background
- landscape - shoot at night
what do black and white points define?
and
what are black and white pints in control of?
which areas of an image should be black and which would be white
control of the tonal range of the image which maximises the image contrast
what is continuous lighting?
is the light that is on for the entire duration of the photo this fns be natural light outside but also can be a window of light. it can be artificial light such as a table lamp to even professional lighting. any type of light as long as it’s continuous
what is flash lighting?
which is only available for a quick moment when triggered. it can be a camera flash.