While photography is all about light, story telling with light in most cases is all about direction. The direction the light hits the subject determines what will and won’t be featured in your story. Featured is not the same thing as lime light nor is the opposite, shadows, mean it is hidden. It’s such an amazing fine line between it all, it is no surprise so many photographers are challenged by making the most of this essential ingredient to our photography. It doesn’t matter the subject, mineral, vegetable, human, animal, how the light plays off it and how you record it is how we as visual communicators, tell our story about the subject. I was wondering around the static aircraft at Oshkosh and found an opportunity to visually show what I’m talking about.
Front lighting is probably our most common and popular lighting source. Front light source often creates an even lighting pattern on our subject. In this case, the top image, the light on both sides of the fuselage is the same. Because the curve of the fuselage is pointing up, the top edge of the fuselage is not seeing the light giving it that dark stripe. That darkness giving way to lightness going down the fuselage is what tells the eye the fuselage has a shape to it. With front lighting, it is very easy to evenly light the entire surface and when we do that, we eliminate shadow and therefore any suggestion of shape.
Now when it comes to exposure, front lighting is the simplest but for most is the most complicated. Why is this? It’s the shadow. I think it’s simple because the matter of shadow is easy to handle. Be it harsh or soft, in my mind, putting it in its place with exposure is a simple matter. For many though this is not the case. Most worry about that shadow, normally it’s too hard and must be dealt with. I would encourage you to embrace shadow rather then fear it. Make the shadows work for you rather then against you. How do you do that? Think of it as visual element, think of it as an asset, think of it as a mystery to the viewer, think of it as anything other then a problem.
Next is side lighting and it’s the light pattern of definition and mystery. How can one lighting pattern do both? Look at this photo of a T-28, what does the side lighting tell you about the fuselage? One thing you can see are the ripples of time, age and to many, experience. Side lighting is a great light for talking about texture. Why is this? It’s shadows again, the play of shadow and highlight is what tells the eye there is a texture. That’s the definition. At the same time the shadow hides certain details like the engine. There is a slight hint to the massive power that pulls this great classic through the air. Other details are hidden as well by shadows, they are hinted to and our imagination fills it in but we don’t directly say what’s there. That’s how side lighting works its magic for us.
Side lighting is great when it comes to exposure because it is so forgivable. Why is that? You can get the exposure “wrong” and to most, it still looks right. But when it comes to telling the story, the right exposure is like adding the right punctuation to a sentence. The more underexposure you add, the deeper the mystery and when played correctly, the greater amount to tap the imagination. In the photo at top, there is my customary -.07 but in this middle photograph, I’ve dialed in -1.7, a full extra stop. Why? Look at the photo, I think that answers the question.
Back lighting, where the light source is streaming right down the lens barrel. I think of this as the sunset light pattern because that’s when most folks use it. At sunset and then the meter naturally underexposes pumping up the colors. Ooooooh! If there is one type of photograph most photographers fall short on are sunrises and sunsets. They get sucked into the color from the process and then forget to tell the story. This is partly because the subject being backlit is all black so it gets ignored and that’s where the story telling ends. Most don’t use shape effectively because no one talks about it, but is that silhouetted subject has a recognizable shape then you start to tell a story. If we go beyond that and give the subject some light value other then black, we increase the story telling as well as exposure complications.
If you just shooting the back lighting then exposure is a no-brainer! The meter will underexpose and you’re good to go. But what if you wanna tell a story, spin a tale and add some intrigue? This is when many throw up their hands and give up but don’t! You have two very simple options, flash fill or HDR. If you think through the problem you will come up with the answer and execute it. If you have a smallish subject you wanna provide more information about, flash fill is a natural. But don’t be satisfied with throwing a flash in the hot shoe and going click. Get the camera out of the hot shoe and off in a direction that emphasizes the back lighting, not just fill in shadow! What does that mean? Lighting the entire subject is not the goal, just giving enough information to tell the story is. Let the imagination to its job, just feed it enough to do it. And think about not only the quantity of light, but quality. If you’re shooting at sunrise/sunset, what’s the quality of that light? It’s warm so using straight flash might not be the answer, you might wanna gel it.
And then there is HDR. The backlit shot of the P-51 is a HDR. You should know that when you look and see the sunset and information in the fuselage. The key here is doing what is called Realistic HDR and knowing light. Look at the fuselage, is it all lit evenly or is there still shadow, mystery? I’m not talking colors here, I’m talking the basics of photography and that is light. If you know the direction of light, know your subject and how to combine those two to tell you story, your photography will explode! If you know this then your exposure problems will disappear. If you know this then your finishing is post will be a snap. Look at that magical ingredient light and passionately grab it and your photography will grow in the direction of light!