What are the lighting skills of commercial photography?

Lead: Photography is a very complete and purposeful artistic behavior, but for commercial photography, it has a clearer purpose and business attitude. Next, I will bring you the lighting skills of commercial photography. Let's have a look!

What are the lighting skills of commercial photography? Commercial photography includes products, advertisements, sample catalogs, industries, companies, portraits, architecture, technology and many other aspects, with a very wide range. An advertising photography order only involves one aspect, while the photography task of a company annual report involves almost all aspects.

Concepts and skills

When accepting the task of taking commercial photos. First of all, we should consider two issues: first, what concepts should be expressed in photos; The second is what skills are used to realize this concept. The most important concept is of course put forward by the customer, which will explain what he needs to show. However, the concept expressed in specific photos must be determined by the shooting effect.

calorescence

Lighting is a job with a strong purpose. After accepting a task, you must first analyze your subject. You must be able to foresee what the final photo will look like in your mind, and then use all means to achieve this goal.

In color product photography, the main light is usually arranged at a position higher than the product and slightly behind. The way to determine the main light is to dim the light, keep your eyes as close as possible to the camera lens, illuminate the subject with a small and easy-to-move test lamp, and observe carefully. Move the test lamp representing the main light, and observe the changes of highlights and shadows until you find a suitable shooting effect. You can also ask the assistant to move the lamp and observe the lighting effect from the ground glass of the camera. After finding the best configuration, move the real main light to position.

The most important feature of a photo is determined by the main light. What lamp should be used to hit the main light, stray light or spotlight? It depends on the need. The light of the astigmatism lamp is wider, the highlights and shadows are softer, the boundary is not obvious, and there are certain details. Focus, highlight highlights and shadows with obvious boundaries, with few details. No matter what kind of lamp is used, the higher the lamp, the weaker the highlight and the more obvious the shadow boundary.

highlight

Add a certain amount of light to outline the specific shape of the subject, which is the role of highlights. Highlights have the ability to exaggerate, can be turned into surprises, and played a wonderful role in expressing the subject properly, so photographers take highlights very seriously.

Highlights have two practical functions. First, use a small spotlight to illuminate from the back of the subject, strengthen the reflection of the edge of the subject, eliminate the sense of flat talk, separate the subject from the environment, and highlight the subject. The second is texture light, which uses a spotlight to sweep the surface of an object from a very low angle to emphasize the texture and give the audience a clear impression of the surface of the object. The arrangement of highlights is more difficult than the main light. If the shape of the subject is complex, it is often necessary to use several small lights to produce suitable highlights.

Auxiliary lamp

The auxiliary light can make small shadow lines appear in the shadow part. The auxiliary light source can be a soft astigmatism lamp or a reflector; If you shoot small objects, you can also reflect light with a mirror. The main requirement of auxiliary light is that it cannot produce shadows by itself. The way to avoid it is to illuminate from a low angle, such as the height of the desktop, or let the lamps be as close to the lens as possible.

Portrait photographers often put auxiliary lights near the optical axis of the lens. In this way, the shadow part that the lens can see is naturally evenly illuminated. This is a very useful method, which can be done in many commodity photography. However, there are some exceptions. Especially in the close-up of still life, it is impossible to put the lamp on the central axis of the lens. Therefore, still life photographers must find another way to eliminate the shadow on the subject. A large soft shadow is almost invisible. A bigger mirror will do. Put a piece of white curved cardboard on the front of the subject to reflect light, and the effect is also good. You can also use an auxiliary light to remove the shadow of the subject's shadow surface. It is also a way to solve the problem by using a large soft light near it and cleverly choosing the angle to cast a shadow that is not obvious to the camera.

Another method to eliminate shadows is selective local lighting. Sometimes you don't have to eliminate all the shadows, just those dazzling shadows and ugly black spots. In this case, you can use a spotlight and a small mirror with a nozzle cover to project a small beam to some needed places, and the problem will be solved.

Perhaps the most effective lighting tool is a mirror. You can put it where you can't put lights. Fix towns with model clay. Sticking the unnecessary places on the mirror with black tape can turn it into a reflector of any shape. When the light comes from the side and back, put the mirror in front of the subject and the shadow will be illuminated.

Every lamp must have a purpose, which plays an important role in the final work. Other lights should not compete with the main light. If adding new lights causes new problems, you should turn them off. Retest. The simplest lighting is often the most effective.

Transparent object

It is troublesome to shoot transparent or mirror objects. When shooting transparent, translucent and reflective objects, the photographer should not only consider the object itself, but also consider everything around, because the shooting result depends largely on the surrounding environment.

When a transparent glassware is illuminated by a lamp. In fact, it is the background behind the light. Translucent objects can reflect colors on the background and colors on the foreground. Mirror objects can reflect everything in front, including lights, cameras, tripods, and even the photographer's own image into the camera.

One approach is to use a special soft mask to surround the main body. Usually this soft mask is made of white paper stretched on the frame. Translucent plastic paper can be easily used to make three-dimensional soft mask. When the spotlight is directly hit on the plastic soft cover, the objects in the soft cover will be illuminated by the scattered soft light. Adding a color acetate film filter in front of the lamp can also enhance the effect of a certain color.

Sticking proper black paper on the soft mask can deepen the dark part of the main body and help to sculpt. Where reflection is needed, make a hole in the soft mask to let the spotlight light enter directly.

If the soft mask is permanent. You can hang it on the ceiling of the studio when not in use. Another method is to paint the whole studio wall in non-reflective white, which is very convenient for high-profile lighting. When you don't need high-profile photos. The temporary walls are made of seamless colored cardboard, and the white ceiling is used to reflect soft top light. Such a studio is most suitable for flash photography.

Reflective object

Use matte spray or coat masking agent; It is often more effective to solve the reflection problem of the subject than to use soft mask. The light spots on the surface of metal objects with complex shapes can be reduced by spraying extinction spray. This spray is packed in a pressure tin can and sold in hardware stores and art stores.

But be careful, this kind of spray is harmful to some plastic products and surface coatings. It is convenient and reliable to spray metal objects with it; Wipe it off immediately after filming. This matte spray can also be sprayed on the back of glasses and glass bottles filled with transparent liquid to make the backlight soft and uniform.

Another way to eliminate the light spot of the subject is to use cosmetic pigment and apply it to the reflective part with camel brush. The amount of coating depends on the surface texture, so the polished aluminized surface should be coated more. After coating, wipe it evenly with a cotton cloth that can't lose silk until no trace can be seen. Light spots on metal objects can also be covered with putty used by glassworkers. Coating technology is very useful for plastic, glass, leather and polished metal surfaces.