Assignment: Mood Lighting
All of Coconino National Forest is closed to all non-authorized users due to excessive fire danger and the half dozen fires already burning which required me to call on last week’s challenge—create in my own backyard—as I endeavored to complete this week’s photo assignment; Front/back/side/soft lighting my subject. “You can’t take a bad photo in Grand Canyon”, I hear from passengers on guided rafting trips. The truth is a great many bad photos are taken in Grand Canyon all the time! And it all comes down to light, the undisputed bedrock of all great photography. Understanding the interplay of light and subject will help all of us create more compelling, polished and intentional images. Back to the catmint with my Nikon D800E and Nikor 70-200 f4. The feasting bees, late afternoon sun and a few passing clouds provided an excellent laboratory to experiment with the effects of different qualities of light.
Front Lighting: Sun—> me—> bee
What do your notice first? Visually? Emotionally? High contrast and hard shadow lines create a visual intensity that communicates to my brain to be on high alert. The direct light on the bee casts a glare and washes out its orange color so that it almost seems lost in the fray. An aerial chase between a hungry bird and a panicked bee might be a more appropriate subject for front lighting. I find this image to agitate my mood.
Back Lighting: Sun—> bee—> me
Again, what do you see and feel? The light shining through the flowers and foliage creates softer shadow lines that temper the contrast and invite my mind to rest within the frame. The bee’s translucent abdomen is aglow with the light shining through it to my lens. The bee’s luminance emerges as the simple and peaceful subject of the photo. The composition and the quality of light are in greater harmony here than in the front lit scene. I find this image to uplift my mood.
Side Lighting: Sun—> bee and me
Wow! This image really pops! Putting the sun to the side of me and my subject seems to have given the scene a brilliant balance of high contrast and the color saturation to match it. Notice the glare AND rich orange of the bee. The shadow lines are crisp but not chaotic. I find this image to excite and entice my mood.
Soft Lighting: Sun—> cloud—> bee and me
Finally, soft light refers to a broader more gradual transition from shadow to light along the shadow line. Contrast is very low, colors are very rich, the eye is encouraged to move smoothly from one detail to the next because it is not being asked to make rough leaps from light to dark. I believe soft light to work best for expansive landscapes because the bee (the subject) might blend in too much with its surroundings if this photo were converted to black and white . This image subdues my mood and leaves me wanting something a little more.
Let’s return to the Grand Canyon for one more moment and think of some of the most exceptional and awe-inspiring images from that place. Now recall some of the more ho-hum shots. What is the quality of the light in the scene? There is no right or wrong answer. Just an inquiry I think we should all contemplate each time we head out into the field with dreams of creating images for the ages.