Lighting plays a major role in photography, hence, you need to get it right. How you illuminate your subject will determine how bad, good, or perfect your photos will be. Whether you are a professional photographer or you love capturing images and moments on weekends, these lighting techniques and tricks will take your images from zero to a hundred.
Tips for Improving Photo Quality with Lighting
- Adopt a Broad Light Source
A broader light source equates to softer light. While using a broad light source minimizes shadows and reduces the texture of the subject, narrow light sources such as flashes and CFLs do the exact opposite. The good news is, you can broaden these sources with a reflector or diffuser device, which helps to bounce the light coming from them. Broad light sources particularly excel at producing the perfect portraits.
- Maintain Minimal Distance Between Your Light Source and Subject
In other words, let your light source be as close as possible to your subject. The idea is that, the closer the light source is to the subject, the broader, and the farther it is, the narrower it becomes. So when taking photos, position your subject close to the light source so you can broaden and soften the illumination.
- Maximize Front-lighting
Front-lighting helps to suppress foreground texture, which de-emphasizes it. As such, Front-lighting is perfect for shooting portraits as it conceals scars and blemishes on your subject’s face. On the flip side, it might not be so good for landscape photography. Instead, use side-lighting to magnify the texture of trees, rocks, sand, bricks, and the like.
- Don’t Forget Color Temperature
Always keep color temperature in mind when shooting so you don’t miss important details. Although light appears white, it does have a color that is non-visible to the eyes but can be detected by camera sensors and recorded as a color cast. Generally, sunlight takes on a warm tone in at early mornings and late afternoons and is bluish at mid-afternoon. While fluorescent lighting radiates blue light, Tungsten lighting casts a yellow light. If you are not a fan of color cast, you can neutralize it by using your camera’s white balance control.
- Leverage Shadows for a Three-dimensional Look
Shadows are a big part of 3D images! Though you might be tempted to relegate them to the background, they can improve picture quality when used the right way. They add volume to your photos, projecting your subject in space and not on a flat surface. They inject realism into your photos making them more real than artificial.
- Step Out of Your Comfort Zone
Don’t be limited by the lighting styles you are used to — light the scene differently than you would on a good day. You can start by switching the camera angle or the position of the key light. Though the pictures may not always turn out as great as you anticipated, experimenting with different lighting setups will help expand your skillset and give room for new ideas and surprisingly fantastic images.
The Takeaway
You can go from taking average photos to superior-quality images by improving your lighting techniques. As a bonus tip, try getting a light meter to weigh the amount of light you need on different and given occasions. With a light meter, you can expertly gauge the ratios and produce consistent quality images. And if you’d love to share these images, look no further than iPhoto.
