Chapter 2: The First
Aesthetic Field- Light
•
Lighting - Is the deliberate manipulation of light and shadows for a
specific communication purpose.
1. The Nature of Light
a.
Light –
is a form of radiant energy that is consisted of separate bits of energy
particles that behave commonly as electromagnetic waves.
b.
The
Spectrum consists of other magnetic energy such as radio waves, X-Rays, and
also satellite transmissions.
c.
Light is
commonly known as “visible radiant energy”.
2. Lighting Purposes and Function
a.
Lighting
is the deliberate control of light and shadows and also to manipulate and
articulate our perception of the environment.
b.
With
different lighting we can see and feel a specific way in which one intends us
to perceive it as.
c.
Because
lighting helps articulate our outer and inner environments, it has outer and
inner orientation functions.
3. The Nature of Shadows
a.
Attached
and Cast Shadows
o
Attached
Shadow– an attached shadow is inevitably fixed to its object. The attached
shadow helps reveal the basic form of an object, but it can also fool you into
perceiving what you normally expect to see. It is a shadow that is on the
object itself. It cannot be seen independent of (detached from) the object.
Attached shadows help us primarily with interpreting an object’s basic shape
and texture.
o
Cast
Shadow – A shadow produced by an object and thrown (cast) onto a surface (part
of the object itself or another surface). The cast shadow may be
object-connected (shadow touches the object producing it) or object-disconnected
(shadow does not touch the object producing it). Cast shadows help us located
an object relative to its surroundings.
b.
Falloff
– Term used to mean two different yet related light/shadow relationships: the
brightness contrast between the light and shadow sides of an object, and the
rater of changed from light to shadow.
o
Contrast
– If the brightness contrast between the lighted side of an object and the
attached shadow is high, the falloff is fast, meaning that the illuminated side
is relatively bright and the attached shadow is dense and dark. If the
brightness contrast is low, the resulting falloff is slow (fast falloff.) A
highly diffused floodlight produces slow falloff. There is little brightness
contrast between the illuminated side and the shadow side. The attached shadow
has become transparent.
o
Change –
Calling falloff “fast” or “slow” makes more sense when applied to the rte of
change between light and dark. The change from light to dark is sudden,
signifying a sharp edge or corner (fast falloff: edge.) When the light on the
surface falls off gradually into its attached shadow, this is known as slow
falloff: curved surface.
o
Controlling
falloff- Falloff can be controlled by using high directional or diffused light
for the basic illumination and by manipulating the amount of fill light. The
directional beam of a spotlight, or the sun, causes sharp contrast between the
illuminated area and the dense attached shadow, therefore the resulting falloff
is fast. On the other hand, floodlights produce slow falloff.
4. Outer Orientation
Functions: How We See An Event
a.
Spatial
Orientation- Lighting reveals the basic shape of an object and where it is
located relative to its environment. The principal light source, the key light,
and the attached shadows carry the major burden of fulfilling the basic shape
function. The cast shadow indicated where the object is: whether it sits on a
table or floats above it, whether it is close to the wall or away from it.
b.
Tactile
Orientation-Lighting for tactile orientation is very closely related to
lighting for spatial orientation. Texture is a spatial phenomenon because a
texture, when sufficiently enlarged, resembles the peaks and valleys, ridges
and crevices of a rugged mountain range. When a directional light hits a
cyclorama (backdrop) from the side, the texture, wrinkles and folds, shows up
more prominently (fast falloff on cyc.) When the very same area of the backdrop
is illuminated with diffused light from the front, the backdrop looks taut and
wrinkle-free (slow falloff on cyc.) In conclusion, you can use falloff control
either to emphasize the texture of a face or to de-emphasize it and make the
skin look taut and smooth. Highly directional hard spotlights hitting the face
from a steep angle create fast falloff. The facial texture-the wrinkles, ridges
and hollows-is accentuated (fast falloff: facial texture emphasized.) When you
want the skin to look smooth and wrinkle-free, you need to reduce rather than
emphasize facial texture (slow falloff: facial texture reduced.)
c.
Time
Orientation- Control of light and shadows also helps viewers determine the time
and even the seasons. In its most elementary application, lighting can show
whether it is day or night. More specific lighting can indicate the approximate
hour of the day or at least whether it is early morning, high noon or evening.
Also, with certain subtle color changes you can also suggest whether it is
winter or summer.
d.
Day and
night- In general, daytime lighting is bright and nighttime lighting is less
so. Because we are used to seeing everything around us during the day but not
at night, we keep the sky or background illuminated for nighttime. We leave it
dark or only partially illuminated for nighttime (Outdoor illumination: Day.) A
daytime scene needs a great amount of all-around light with everything brightly
illuminated, including the background. Nighttime lighting needs more specific
and more selective fast-falloff illumination. Nighttime lighting does not mean
“no light” but rather highly selective light with a minimum of spill. The light
must also come from an obvious source like the moon or a streetlamp (outdoor
illumination: Night.) For nighttime the background is predominantly dark and
the lighting in the rest of the interior becomes more selective. In daytime
lighting, the lamp is turned off and the window is light, in nighttime the lamp
is on but the window is dark (Indoor Lighting: Night.)
e.
Clock
time- The common indicator of clock time is the length of cast shadows. At high
noon shadows are very short. Outdoor shadows are usually cast along the ground.
Long cast shadows tell us that the sun is in an early-morning or late-afternoon
position. At noon cast shadows are optimally short (Cast shadows tell time.)
The same shadow requirement holds for shooting indoors. Rather than have the
cast shadows fall on the studio floor, you should devote fair amount of
background lighting to producing cast shadows, or even slices of light that cut
across the background at the desired angle. An angled slice of light on the
background can substitute for a cast shadow as a time indicator (Slice of
light.)
f.
Seasons-
The winter sun is generally weaker and colder than the summer sun so the light
representing the winter sun should be slightly more bluish. The winter sun also
strikes the earth’s surface from a fairly low angle, even at noon this makes
cast shadows in winter longer and not quite as dense as summer.
5. Inner Orientation Functions: How We Feel About an Event
Review:
Outer orientation functions of lighting = light and shadows manipulated to
articulate the outer environment
Inner
orientation = a lighting function used to articulate the inner environment (our feelings and
emotions)
a.
Establishing mood and atmosphere
o 2
major aesthetic lighting techniques for establishing mood & atmosphere:
1. High-key lighting: the scene has an
abundance of bright, usually slow-falloff illumination and a light background
·
Used for news sets, interview areas, game shows,
and situation comedies
·
Reflects normalcy or upbeat feeling
Google images
2. Low-key lighting: fast-falloff
illumination is highly selective, leaving the background & part of the
scene mostly dark
·
Less overall light & fewer light sources
than high-key lighting (scenes in caves, dungeons, submarines, etc.)
Google images
b. Above- and below-eye-level key-light position
o Above eye level = what we expect; when
principal light comes from above the subject/object creating shadows underneath protrusions
o Below eye level (aka reverse modeling) =
when the principal light source strikes the face from below eye level causing
shadows to reverse vertically
1.
Since we are used to seeing lighting come from
above, the reverse shadowing disorients us and creates a feeling of surprise,
suspicion, or fear (sometimes called “horror lighting”)
o This
minor position change of the key light influences our perception of the
subject’s credibility and character.
c. Predictive lighting helps to suggest a
coming event
o Causes
a feeling of anticipation
o Examples:
1. Normal
slow-falloff lighting à
fast-falloff lighting
2. High-key
(“up”) à
low-key (“down”) or vice versa
3. Moving
light sources (e.g. character walking in dark with flashlight)
o Usually
works in conjunction with appropriate sounds, suspenseful music, etc. à oncoming changes of
events are more often introduced by predictive sound
d.
Light and lighting instruments as dramatic
agents
o Dramatic agent = an element that
operates as an aesthetic intensifier in a scene
o Show
the actual light source (the sun, a flashlight, a spotlight, etc.)
o Examples:
flashing red & blue police lights; on/off blinking motel sign
No comments:
Post a Comment