How to learn to use light in photography

First, understand the characteristics of light.

Every art form has its own unique expression. The photographer's means of expression is light. Without light, they are as accomplished as sculptors without clay or painters without pigments.

Although photography has formed its own different schools and styles with painting, literature and other art forms in the development of 150 years, especially in the past 50 years, futuristic photography, absurd photography, editing photography, stereoscopic mud photography and so on can all find similarities with sister art in form, but they are still different after all. One of the reasons is that photographers give full play to the unique modeling means of photography-the language of light. Through light, they form their own modeling methods and decide the expression intention of the picture; Through light, it is not only different from other sister arts, but also produces its own artistic style among photographers.

Creative photographers often say that understanding light is the most important part of a photographer's artistic talent. There are many different forms of light itself, and photographers can choose the most suitable form to achieve special purposes. The forms of these lights can be controlled, and they can be used to clearly express the characteristics, concepts and emotions of specific subjects in photos. Before making full use of the great potential of light, photographers must analyze light, understand its various characteristics, and be familiar with its various functions and uses.

American photographer A. Farninger pointed out that for photographers, light has three main attributes: intensity, quality and color. The first is strength. The intensity of light can be from bright to dark, which is suitable for any light source. For example, in cloudless weather, the sunshine at noon is very strong, and in windy and dusty weather, the light is dim. There is no light at night. The intensity of the artificial light source varies with the wattage of the lamp.

Farninger believes that bright light gives people a dazzling, bright and serious feeling, while dim light often shows melancholy, tranquility and implicit feelings. This difference in light intensity will be manifested in three different ways in photos: the brightness of the subject, the contrast range of the subject, and the color restoration of the subject in color photos.

When the illumination intensity is very high, the object appears brighter, more vivid and has greater contrast, and the color appears more vivid than in the light with low illumination intensity. If a photographer is good at grasping and cherishing this different change of the subject, he can better highlight the characteristics of a specific subject with appropriate intensity of light. It is important that this characteristic of lighting should be shown in photos. Some photographers often think that very bright light will make the subject look too dazzling, the strong light part is too bright and the shadow part is too dark, so they artificially reduce this contrast and take relatively low-contrast photos, resulting in a complete lack of typical features under special lighting conditions. For example, the scene of tapping in an open hearth furnace, the hot molten steel is bright and dazzling, so that you can't see anything except black and white.

Farninger believes that at this time, as some people do, using very strong auxiliary light to soften and reduce the contrast will completely destroy the dramatic effect of this scene. When a sensitive photographer encounters this subject, he will completely abandon all the rules and regulations he has learned about using light, and only consider how to show the impression of hot and dazzling molten steel: by emphasizing the characteristics of lighting, strengthening contrast, and using silhouette and halo effect, he will try his best to capture this vivid scene.

The second characteristic of light is its different quality. The light can be direct light emitted by a thermal light source, such as sunlight not blocked by clouds, direct artificial light emitted by spotlights, photographic lamps and flashlights; Or scattered light reflected by the surface of the irradiated object, such as sunlight on foggy or cloudy days, artificial light reflected by the surface of walls, ceilings or other objects that reflect light; Or add scattered light formed by soft light in front of the thermal light source.

Direct light is intense and dazzling, with great contrast, which can cause clear and prominent shadows. The scattered light formed by reflection is soft and the contrast is small, which will cause gray, fuzzy shadows or no shadows at all. Of course, there are countless transitional stages between the two. Practice shows that the shadow caused by direct light can change with the position between the light source and the subject, or between the photographer and the light source. This bright shadow can strengthen or weaken the characteristics of the subject because of its shape, style and the size of the part it occupies. Reflected light can show the shape of the object and reproduce its original appearance naturally, but it has little to do with the relative position of the object and the light source. Therefore, Farninger pointed out that direct light is more difficult to use successfully than scattered light, because improper use will make the result worse. But if used properly, it will make photographers take photos with strong contrast and bright black and white patterns, which is far better than the effect obtained by scattered light.

The third property of light proposed by Farninger is color. He pointed out that those color photographers who are committed to color reproduction must make it clear that the color of illumination (its color temperature) should be consistent with the color temperature required by color film. For example, the light in the morning and evening is not suitable for solar film, and the photos taken with this film are yellower or redder than the scenery seen by the eyes. In addition, sunlight in outdoor shadows is usually a little blue.

American photographer Arthur Goldsmith believes that light has two characteristics: objectivity and subjectivity. It is necessary for photographers to take care of both. The so-called objective light refers to a narrow band in the electromagnetic spectrum, which enables us to see and record images. However, Goldsmith pointed out that it is also important to make good use of subjective light as a creative factor in photography while accurately measuring this light for correct exposure. . Subjective light is light that allows us to respond to feelings.