Project 3

Project 3

Portrait Lighting

Intro

Portrait Lighting set-ups

There are basically five commonly excepted portrait lighting setups in photography. These portrait lighting setup are based on the placement of the main light, relative to the subject and camera.

Out of the five types of portrait lighting set-ups, three are related to both subject AND camera position. In most portrait situations, the subject will be pointing his(or her) nose to one side of the camera or the other. This will mean that the camera will see more of one side of the face than the other. Lets call the more exposed side of the face, the broad side of the face and the less exposed side of the face the short side.

Lighting Ratios

Common Lighting Ratios

Ratio

Stops
Difference

Description

1:1

No
Difference

Flat
lighting

2:1

1
Stop

General
color photography

3:1

1
1/2 Stops

General
black & white photography

4:1

2
Stops

Dramatic
lighting, low key

8:1

3
Stops

Very
dramatic, low key

Broad Lighting

Broad portrait lighting is when the main light is illuminating the broad side of the face and the shadow from the nose is being cast onto the short side of the face. In other words, broad lighting is when the more exposed side of the face is facing toward the main light. Another way of thinking of this is to say that the nose is NOT facing toward the same side of the camera that this light is coming from.

Short Lighting

– Short lighting is just the opposite. Short portrait lighting is when the main light is coming from the short side of the subject and the broad side of the face is more in shadow. In other words… If the subject’s nose is facing left and the light is coming from that same side.

* Notice how the patch of light is on the "large side of the face.

Rembrandt Lighting

Rembrandt Portrait Lighting – Rembrandt lighting is a name given to the lighting effect that the old master used to use for the lighting effects in many of his paintings. It’s basically short lighting where the shadow from the nose connects with the shadow on the side of the face, thus creating a triangle of light on the short side of the face. If the nose shadow does not connect with the cheek shadow, it’s not considered to be Rembrandt lighting, just short lighting.

Split Lighting

In Broad, Short and Rembrandt lighting, there will be a patch of light cast onto the shadow side of the face. If the main light is placed so far off to the side of the subject that the patch disappears and only half the face is lit, then it is considered to be “Split” portrait lighting. With split lighting, it rally doesn’t matter to which side of the camera the nose is pointing or if the lit or shadow side of the face is facing toward the camera. Either of these situations would be considered split portrait lighting.

Butterfly lighting

Butterfly Portrait lighting – Butterfly lighting is named that because of the shape of the shadow created directly beneath the nose. When the nose is pointing in the direction of the light, wherever it may be, and the light is high enough to cast a downward shadow, you end up with butterfly portrait lighting.

Portrait lighting on the vertical axis – When most portrait photographers discuss portrait lighting, they talk about the lighting set-ups mentioned above. One subject that seldom gets talked about is lighting on a vertical axis. How high should you position the light?

There is no concrete answer to that. It all will depend on the specific subject. Again, photography is an art form and different artists will select different light positions. For me, I try to get the light as high as I can without casting a shadow from the eye socket onto the eye. I like to see both eyes lit. (except for split lighting) this lighting position will be different with each individual. Some people have deeper eye sockets than others. Some people look Asian –like and some look like Neanderthals. With Neanderthals, I simply lower the light until I see those baby browns. If the subject is “normal”, whatever that is, I like to raise the light to a point that the nose shadow is cast nicely downwards. I just think it looks a little weird to see the shadow from the nose cast horizontally across the cheek. Light comes from above, which makes light from above more comfortable.

Light #1 is called the “key” or “main” light. It is the main source of light for the subject. It’s main purpose is not only to light the subject but also to provide depth by creating shadows. This is why the position of the key light is off camera left.

Light #2 is called the fill light. I have it slightly off camera right, which is fine, but you really want to keep it as close to the camera’s axis as possible. For a standard portrait, you want to have the fill light at about half power compared to the key light. This is not an absolute (nothing in photography is). If you want the shadows more prominent then use less fill light. The point is that you want the fill light to produce less light than the key light or you will lose the depth in the portrait.

Light #3 is called the hair light in this position. It’s purpose is to separate the subject from the background by lighting the hair. This effect greatly improves upon the three dimensional look a professional quality portrait should produce. Light #3 can be used in a different way to separate the subject from the background as seen below.

3 Light Setup w/

Hairlight

You’ll notice that light #2 has been replaced by a reflector. The strength of the light being “bounced” off of the reflector onto your subject is varied by moving the reflector closer or further from the subject. This is a very easy and economical way to slowly build up your studio set up. If you have to buy one light at a time you can purchase a handful of used reflectors to help get the most out of your existing set up. Besides, reflectors are a great tool to use in daylight photography.
Remember that all of these lights can be adjusted in many different ways. Height, power, and angle all have an important role in determining the outcome of each session. Practice and experimentation is key to being able to flatter your subject.

Key Lighting

High key, low key, and mid key are three classical ways of understanding portrature. In general they can be equated to exposure and the overall tone of the image.
The color of the background, the clothing, and any props in the image all play a role in the tonality of the image.

High key

High key can be equated to overexposure where highlight detail is purposefully lost.
A high key image tends to have more bright elements then dark and is often described as happy.
The background is typically white or off white.
The background is often overexposed by 3/4 of a stop to become pure white.
High key images are shot with lower lighting ratios of 2:1 or even 1:1

Mid key

Mid key can be equated to proper exposure represents the type of portature most of us have been exposed to while growing up in our years of school portraits. Mid key images have most of their tones in the middle of the histogram with no extreme highlights or shadows.

Mid key portrature is what we see the most often and it is the easiest to achieve.
Almost all of the subject lighting scenarios can be achieved using mid key lighting,
including flat, butterfly, short, broad, window, profile, split, short, rim and cross.

Low key

Low key can be equated to underexposed images, that have a dark moody quality and shadow detail is purposefully lost. A low key image tends to have more dark elements than bright elements and is often described as moody. It is a predominantly dark image with small areas of brightness. The background is dark. The subject's cloths are dark. Props are dark, etc. Low key images are typically shot with a higher lighting ratio of 3:1 or greater.