Join Natalie Fobes for an in-depth discussion in this video Deconstructing photos to study lighting, part of Lighting for Photographers: Portraiture.
Great photographers know how to control light, how to bend it, how to incorporate it into …their photographs. …One of the best ways to learn about lighting is to deconstruct or reverse engineer the photograph. …There are lots of clues that can help you analyze the lighting. …Let's take a look at a few of the images I took for this course and deconstruct them together. …It's obvious to me that there are two lights in this photograph. …You can see one in the backdrop, and then one illuminating our subject.…
But there's more information that we can learn from examining the shadows. …For example, I can tell that in the background the light is probably pretty high and very …close to the backdrop. …The reason I can tell it's high is because I can see the shadows underneath the fabric folds. …The reason I know that is very close to the backdrop is because I can see that the falloff …from light to dark is very fast.…
So that indicates that it's very close to that background cloth. …Taking a look at his face I can see by the shadows that the light is placed camera left, …
Next, Natalie details a variety of common one-light and two-light lighting techniques, explaining exposure, metering considerations, and light modifiers along the way.
The course concludes with several lighting tips, including minimizing physical challenges and do-it-yourself lighting gear instructions.
- Understanding lighting positions
- Deconstructing photos to study lighting
- Lighting a portrait for a Rembrandt pattern
- Backlighting in portraits
- Examining a four-light portrait scenario
- Lighting for different skin tones