Lighting for Photography - part 1 - What is Light?

Lighting in photography…

… is, well, everything! There wouldn’t be any photography without light. But what kind of light is best? That is the (loaded) question we are going to answer in this series of videos.

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Warm light at sunset

This video is the first in a 7-part series examining the common approaches to lighting for photography. In this episode I describe the upcoming series and lay out the topics that will be covered in the remaining six videos. This video also covers a few basic principles of light - what it is, the visible spectrum, color temperature, white balance, and brightness - all subjects that will come up again during the series. This episode gets most of the science out of the way, so that the remaining episodes can concentrate on the practical applications of photographic lighting.

The blue hour

The subsequent videos are going to look at 5 common sources of light used in photography - sunlight, incandescent, fluorescent, LED, and flash. In each video we will cover how the light is generated, its application in photography, the pros and cons of that light source, and techniques for modifying the light. Each episode will also include a section on when, where, and how a given light source can be used in macro photography. The final episode will discuss the special cases of lighting for microscopy and video applications, and will conclude with a description of my best practices for macro lighting.

I hope you find the material helpful in your own photography!

Allan