5 Lighting Rules Every Photographer Should Master
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- Опубликовано: 30 июл 2024
- For more information about my workshops please visit johngress.com/workshops/
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Rough Transcript
5 Lighting Concepts Every Photographer Should Master
Welcome back everyone if you could please like and subscribe I would really appreciate it. I hope your year is off to a great start. I started off the year with Covid so I guess I’m glad that I got that out-of-the-way, again, but as I have been relaxing over the past few weeks, I’ve been watching a lot of content. Included in that was a series of photography lighting instructional videos from the 80s and if that sounds like torture believe me it kind of was. The instructor Used needlessly large words and confusing language while explaining basic concepts. I couldn’t decide if he was just relaying the information the way he learned it, or if was trying to use big words to sound smarter or perhaps he was trying to confuse most of the viewers as a method of gatekeeping.
With this approach to teaching, which I think has been more common over the years than it should be, it’s not surprising that people would feel intimidated and have difficulty learning lighting.
So in today’s video I want to share with you five key lighting concepts that will help you understand lighting and help you to harness it’s power the next time you’re in the studio or on location. Hopefully, without any pretense and hopefully with the most simple language possible.
1. Size = Softness
The first law we’ll discuss today is size = softness. I have always heard it defined as the larger the light source is relative to your subject (basically how big it looks from their perspective) the softer it will be. The opposite is true as well. The smaller the light source looks to the model, the more crisp the shadows will appear.
So lets look at two portraits of the same model. One where the light source looked very small to the model, and one where it look rather large. If we look at the shadow from his nose in both images you’ll see that its very sharp with the small light source and quite subtle with the large source.
2. Angle = Texture
Having your light at an angle to the subject will result in more shadows and therefore more texture than if it were head on
3. More Bouncing = less contrast
When light bounces around a room that light brightens the shadows and
decreases contrast. This could either help to produce more dynamic range and more pleasing skin texture or if could prevent you from getting the crisp results you’re trying to create.
4. Inverse Square Law
(Doubling the distance eats up two stops of light. Or halfing the distance = 4x the light.)
You lose two f-stops worth of light every time you move a light twice as far away from the subject. This means that moving a light that’s close to your subject will have a bigger impact on exposure than it will if you move a light that is across the room a few feet. Once you understand this fall-off principal you can start to make all kinds of decisions when it comes to designing your set and your lighting setup. For instance. If your background is too dark and you only have one light, move it closer to your model or move everything closer to the background. If you’re using a v-flat to bounce your main light back into the shadows and your shadows are too dark, move the Vflat closer to the subject.
5. Color Changes Mood
We associate sadness and cold with blue and happiness and warmth with yellow. So adding a little bit of color with gels to our scenes we can change the emotion of the shot.
Thank you so much for watching if you enjoy learning from me and his videos you probably would also love learning from me in person. Soon I’ll be teaching workshops in New York, DC, Atlanta, Denver, LA and at my own studio in Chicago. So for more information and to sign up just go to johngress.com/workshops. Plus you can save $50 if you sign-up with the coupon code Earlybird today.
Stay safe, have a great day and I will talk to you soon!
Music: Evolution by Bensound bensound.com/ 
Хобби
Finally, explained concisely in one place! Texture/light angle cleared up a lot of frustration.
That's great to hear. Thank you!
Some of the best lighting instruction I’ve ever come across, I appreciate all of your help, John!
Wow, thanks!
Excellent , concise and easy to understand! Bravo & gratitude John.
Thanks Henry! Glad it was helpful!
Another great video, thank you John! You are excellent at explaining these complex concepts in a such a clear way.
Thank you so much Pete! I really appreciate it!
Glad you recovered John. Thanks once again for another great video. You’re a great teacher. 💯
Thank you so much Jamal! I really appreciate it.
Such quality. You have a talent for communication and teaching. Thanks as always!
Thanks Adam! You are too kind!
Loved your analysis on the 80s instructional video. Very well scrutinized the way you narrowed it down to, "How he learned it, to try to sound smart, or as a method of gate-keeping." First thing I thought was that confusion was a method of gate-keeping. I watched the rest of your video because of this type of thoughtful insight on your part.
Thank you so much! For what its worth I did learn that this is how photographers talked back then.
Thank you John. All great tips to practice.
Glad you enjoyed it Dawn! Practice has been the secret to my success.
So easy to understand and in such short time. Please do something like that again! :)
Maybe with a test shooting or a different topic.
Thank you so much!
Its always great to watch your videos. Indeed explained in a pretty simple way.
Thanks! I really appreciate it!
Thanks John, always enjoying your tutorials.
My pleasure! Thank you!
great tips! i just did my official first studio shoot and turned out pretty good, gonna put together a video on it as well! I loved the "color = moods" tip. Definitely a fun one to play with!
Thanks will. Looking forward to seeing it.
Just started subscribing to you. Your work is so simple and incredible. Thank you for being you!
Thank you so much Jace!
Thanks John for making this video on basic lighting concepts. IMO, too many photographers are obsessively focused on lenses, cameras and all that gear when lighting often makes or bust any image. Key to any expressive image is lighting FAR beyond what lenses and camera might do. Second to this is shapes blended with effective composition. High quality studio lighting can offer remarkable control over lighting, quality of light and bring to images special qualities that can only be achieved by proper and creative use of high quality studio lighting. These five basic lighting concepts applies not only to studio lighting, but to video-cinema and outdoor "natural" lighting... as exampled by cloudy overcast days acting as a Ginormous soft "light box" or bright sunlight via a window creating harder directional lighting.
Thank you so much! I hope videos like these become my most popular videos as gear is so over rated. Once you own it all - then what?
Excellent summary! Short but to the point.
Thanks Marc. Glad you liked it!
Thanks for sharing this John
You bet! Thank you!
Loved this so much! Thank you
Thanks! I’m glad it was helpful.
Glad I found your channel! Wish I could be one of the 3 in your Chicago workshop, your work is fabulous.
Me too! Thank you so much! I have one spot left and I’d love to have you.
That was great!
Thanks Jon!
This was great!
Thanks!!
Always some good info here, thanks JOhn!
Any time! Thanks for the complement!
Good info as always John, and that vest you were wearing was "proper"! 👌🏾👍🏿
Thanks Jeffrey! Glad you liked it!
Thank you for this. Learnt a lot from this.
Thank you! Glad it was helpful!
Great video, great rules. Thanks, John!
Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it!
Brilliant as always. 🙂
Thanks! I really appreciate it!
I saw an angel :P (I am sure you meant angle)
What I like most about your tutorials is how relaxed you are/speak. Greetings from Germany!
Danke! Don't tell anyone, but the angels are my lighting secret!
@@JohnGress okay, it’s among us. I know, everyone hates weisenheimers, but that was such a cute typo that I couldn’t resist.
Weisenheimers is today's word of the day!
@@JohnGress to be honest: I’ve googled it. In Germany we say Klugscheisser (smart shitter) or Besserwisser (better knower)
Besserwisser sounds fun to my Anglo-German American ear!
Great video love your content and glad you better stay safe out here.
Thanks Duke! I think I am bullet proof for a little bit. Knock on wood.
Your lessons are just wonderful
Thank you so much!
i love the job you did with Manny Ortiz photos ,was WOW🏆
Thank you co much!
A very good presentation. Fundamental and basic to understanding how to create a photograph.
Thanks!!
This is an awesome tutorial, that was very useful...
Thanks! Glad it was helpful!
Thanks for this video my man! Be safe at ImagingUSA next week!!! I was supposed to go but cancelled, its going to end up being 1 heck of a Omicron event.
Thanks! Sorry you can't make it.
Thanks for nice video John, informative like always. Please, where to buy the mannequin head you are using in this video?
Thanks! Its made by Pivot Point and used to train hair dressers. This one is wearing a wig =)
I know the use of "Angel" instead of "angle" was a mistake in your graphic with the mannequin head @ 2:44 mark.
It could be the texture Angel ;) THX
👍🏾
Awesome as ever sir. Best explanation of the inverse square law I've ever heard :-) I wonder if you could tell me what the music is you use at intervals? Is it music you had custom made, or is it open commons license, from RUclips?
Thank you so much! It's Evolution by Bensound and its free to use in most cases (some uses you have to pay for), so long as you mention them in the description. bensound.com/
@@JohnGress awesome! I have always wondered. Thanks man. Have now listened to it in full. What a great resource that site is.
@@tedsmith_photography Good question. Maybe I listened to it once. I love their site, it's sort of one stop shopping for all of my needs.
You are an angel ;)
You’re too kind!
@@JohnGress rewatch your video and check out your point #2 haha
ruclips.net/video/61PKwZq1bNE/видео.html
Hi John
Maybe this question is not relevant to what you do but I try my chance.
Is there any way to use Elinchrom modifiers on Godox lights?
Thanks in advance.
Sort of. It’s possible to get a Bowen’s to Elinchrom adapter on eBay or amazon and use it on the reflectors, the indirect modifiers and the Litemotiv 120. Unfortunately the fabric on the Rotalux softboxes gets in the way of the adapter.
Шикарная работа
Спасибо!
I want types of cameras that do not dim in the light, that is, if you are filming during the day and there is a window behind you and you are standing in front of it, most of the cameras have a dark video image, and this is annoying, but some cameras keep the image in its quality. I want to know what these types are
You need to use your camera on Manual, the "M" mode.
Angel = Texture, that's right😂
ruclips.net/video/1PlrjTLQego/видео.html
Cool stuff. I'm guessing the old lighting instructor you watched was Dean Collins. More than big words, I thought he acted like he was high on cocaine. Hard to keep up with.
Thanks! I can neither confirm or deny!
@@JohnGress hehe
@@MileyonDisney I was going to say Dean also. I met him at a seminar he put on in Hollywood back in ‘82/‘83 when I was about 20. He was a revolutionary master of light and deserved to use big words, but yeah he was coked out big time. Ha! I had his entire printed series “Finelight” but unfortunately traded it. At least I was able to find it on DVD and PDFs more recently. Now for me to watch this video.
What about Salt Lake City area??
Denver or LA will be your best bet.
If you could offer a worksop in Indianapolis i could attend
It would be great to have you come up to my studio in Chicago. I will probably never have a workshop in Indy, STL or Cincy.
👍🏽👍🏽👍🏽💯❤
🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼😊
“If you have a … V-flat“? Right…
Sure I have a lot of V-flats. For V-flattening purposes.
Only yesterday I V-flattened a number of (cough, cough) …ises
Seriously, I can’t imagine there’d be anything new in this video for someone who knows what a V-flat is.
Angel does = texture, yes this is true
ruclips.net/video/1PlrjTLQego/видео.html
I am aware that there is a typo in one of the slides. If that really irked you, then please click on this link: ruclips.net/video/1PlrjTLQego/видео.html
On the inverse square law rule, your comment "If your background is to dark and you only have one light, just move it closer to your model" doesn't quite work. Moving the light closer to the model will brighten the model proportionally much more than it will lighten your background, once you adjust the exposure the background ends up effectively darker compared to the subject.
For example. with a light 6ft from the subject and 12ft from the light , you end up with the light on the background being 1/4 of the intensity of the subject - 2 stops difference. If you bring the light to 3 ft from the subject it's now 9 ft from the background, the background is now only receiving 1/9th of the light compared to the subject - 3 and a bit stops difference.
I was referring to moving the background or moving the subject closer to the background as I showed in the example.
@@JohnGress OK, I watched it over a couple of times and, to me, the first part of the comment sounded like just moving the light. After that you suggested moving the subject to the background.
@@JohnGress you said if your background is too dark and you only have one light, just move IT closer your model. I agree with Andrew on this part. IT sounds like you’re referring to the light you just mentioned, not the model or BG. The next thing you said was half correct about moving everything closer to the background. You really only need to move the subject closer to the BG, unless you’re wanting to maintain equal source size, then yes, move the light in too. Nice condensed info overall. Obviously people learning will want to take your expanded courses to fully benefit from your knowledge and techniques. Keep up the great work! Oh and try not to get the Rona for the 3rd time. That’s one charm you don’t need again!
I should have been more clear.
Angle, not angel.
ruclips.net/video/61PKwZq1bNE/видео.html
@@JohnGress Time waster. I'm moving on.