Lighting

What's that?

Well we all know what lighting is, it's just how a scene gets it's light from the surroundings but what types are there and how does this impact the scene itself? Well hopefully by the end of this post you'll understand what the different types of lighting are and to what types of scenes these have the most impact on.

Three Point Lighting:

Now this sounds confusing but it's relatively simple, three locations within a scene where you place some low-key [talked about later] lights in order to light the scene more or give a specific emphasis, or light to it to highlight maybe a shadow or particular person. As you can see above there's how a general three point lighting set-up would look, now this doesn't really necessarily explain everything that well so I'll do it now.

Key lighting: This is your main light, this is always going to be the first one that you set up as this is not only your primary source of light but also a guideline for what angles to move the other two at to get the right effect.

Fill lighting: Now unlike the Key which is normally an intense light this one is a lot softer and is used to fill in a few more areas on the subject that the key might either leave or not give the right amount of light to.

Back light: Last is the back light, while this may not give as an immediate effect it's clear that it does something though which is that it gives it more of a dimension to the image making it look more real than the flat image that just the other two would give.

Below is an example of the lighting setup we just talked about:

Obviously this image has some good and bad points, on the one hand the model is centred with a good amount of light to highlight the models face as well as creating a more three dimensional image and there's enough shadow behind to put emphasis on the highlights (such as the light reflected in the eyes) and the overall features. However this is not without flaws either, the big shadow at the back draws the audiences eye to focus more to that than the main subject itself. The lighting is soft enough that not all the features are clearly defined, and linking to that there's no theme or placement for the lighting it's generic enough to pass for a decent quality yet without a subject it doesn't hold as good a meaning.

Generally this is what a normal lighting set will be like, but there's also lighting types too which give different effects and meanings to the scenes with each one. So lets go through them each in turn and discuss the various effects that each has.

Edge Lighting: This lighting is more solid than the other two types that we'll be looking at later but basically long or short of this type is that one portion of the face is highlighted (inside of the light) and another that's pretty much encased within shadow making the contrasts higher,  the actual source of the light can vary between natural (or high key) and artificial (low key) so long as there's an off set for the shadow to make the highlights appear lighter and then the shadows darker to ensure that the Edge lighting is achieved. This type of lighting does normally create some interesting connotations.

One of which is the idea of duality, having the character highlighted with this split type of lighting showing maybe the more known side whilst demonstrating that there's another side that isn't normally scene or that it's much darker than the character themselves.

Here's an example from film vs an interpretation from me:

In this image we see a more clearly defined version of edge lighting that gives a better visual example of the technique, the lighting is probably a bit darker than necessary to show the lighter half but it still gives the representation in enough detail to show what the light is about. The shot is good, it helps to prove the point of the technique and show off the impact that it can have in the right scenes. But this isn't entirely faultless, the lighting could've been a bit brighter to make sure that you can see the image clearly and then you have more of a sharper and hardline shadows which draws away from the image as it's bold against the backdrop so that could've been lightened up a bit more.

In this image you can see that edge lighting is still present but that it's a lot softer and maybe not as bold as can be expected (like the image above) but it still gives a good demonstration of edge lighting within an outside setting. 

This is a shot from the trailer of Batman (2021) and the connotation of duality that I mentioned earlier works well with this shot in the context of the scene, as there's someone there for Batman which is the side that's shaded and hidden, while Bruce is in the light and in the public eye yet still retaining some of the darkness hinted at in the character themselves.  

Rembrandt Lighting: 

So this is similar to edge lighting but requires a bit more effort behind it, there's usually a light or two active and then a reflector is used to achieve the light used to create a similar feeling to that of Edge lighting but this has a different end result to the other as there's more light on the other half of the character with a triangle of light on their face.

In terms of what light is being used of either high-key or low-key there isn't that much difference in terms of effect between this and Edge that we discussed it just involves more play with angles and light intensity to make sure that you get that triangle of light in the shot that defines the actual lighting type itself. However the backing is different because it isn't actually a seemingly recent development within the industry, it came from a Dutch artist of the same name in the 17th Century who used this type of light in his paintings.

Here's my attempt at mimicking this effect vs a use in film:

So here is an example of Rembrandt with the light triangle by the light outlined to show off where it is, as you can see there is a lighter and darker side of the face but this time around there's only a small section of light in the darkened section which gives a more dramatic effect and shows off maybe a certain point of the character.

So this image works well in showing off the technique but there's still a lighting and shadow issue that makes the image more darker than necessary and background shadows more bold making them a bit more of a focus. 

Here's an example from film that's using primarily natural light to make this hence why the darker side is a bit lighter than normal, but the effect is still the same in that there's the light in the darkened section of the image. This light adds a bigger dimension to the image making it  appear more bold and seemingly three dimensional, now lights like this and the Edge are more primarily seen in film noir styles as the effect works even better because it's there's no real colour pallet other than shades of white, grey and black. Having these films using this light gives better emphasis to the mood or the lights in the room drawing the audience into the scene and the characters in it.

Butterfly Lighting:

Now this is of a much different tone and style to the previous two, primarily because there's a few less and different methods to make sure that it's achieved. So to get it the process is quite simple and requires a bit less to get the achieved effect, basically how this works is that the subject is in one spot and then you take the key light (check diagram above if you're confused) and raise it above the subject to get a bit of shadow at two sides of the face. It was more of a 50's film trend than a more modern one.

Here's my interpretation vs an example from film:

Here's my interpretation of butterfly lighting, as you can see it's much better than the previous two as it's got a clear and bright image with lights focusing down on the face and giving shadows to the edges of the face.

In terms of what worked, you can clearly see that there's a shadow on either side of the face and that the light is centered on the main portion of the face.

However there are a few things wrong with it, like for example the position of the light isn't as centered as it could be to get the best effect possible and it was maybe a bit too high as there seems to be a focus of light on the forehead rather than the entire face but the effect is still reached even with these positioning errors.

Here is a picture of an actress popular from the 50's called Audrey Hepburn, and this as I mentioned earlier was a very popular style for actresses of the 50's in like glamour and fashion as it gave highlights to the shape of the face. It's also used to highlight the beauty of a love interest within the plot as it draws interest and emphasis to the face of the character.

As you can see, the light is at a height where the neck has a light shadow and then a more defined where the head is and then there's a clear line down each side of the face giving it the outline to draw attention to the middle part of the face where the characters eyes would be.

Well that about wraps up lighting styles and techniques, hopefully you learned something new and how lighting can give certain impacts to your piece.