Great photographers take it a step farther: call it instinct, experience, knowl-
edge, or all the above, but some photographers actually feel the light. These
great photographers can naturally sense the correct exposure of the image.
They understand the light around their subject.
The ability to feel that light doesn’t happen overnight. Rather, it comes with
experience and lots of shooting—all while learning to master the fundamental
concepts of photography. It’s practically impossible to teach someone how to
feel light in one book, so my intentions are to help you see the light first.
Practice Makes Perfect. Being able to see great light is a step toward pro-
ducing consistent and creative results that will help you to develop your
unique photographic style. The first step in that journey is to practice finding
light. It’s not always easy to find, though it’s there, as with the absence of
light is darkness.
There is no better time than the present to begin this practice, so take a
deep breath and look around the room you’re sitting in right now. What
sources of light do you see? A window, a light above your head, a lamp on your
desk—or, if you’re extremely lucky, the light from your 150-gallon saltwater
aquarium?
If you said yes to a combination of the above, you’re an average photogra-
pher who probably takes pictures (more like snapshots), not photographs. If
you said, “Wait! There’s more!” and pointed out the four walls in your room,
the floor, the mirror, your monitor, the television, or even your hall light, then
you’re probably a photographer who takes photographs more often than pic-
tures. Let’s not forget, light falls on everything in its path. It’s the diffusion
and/or reflection of the light that we actually see through obstacles in its
path—rarely do we see light in its purest form.
For the next month or two, practice looking for the light in every room you
walk into. Challenge yourself to find the light in every corner, and coming off
of every wall, floor, or door, as even everyday items like your refrigerator re-
flect light.
Here’s another tip for learning to see light: Use a studio lighting kit that
allows you to turn off your modeling lights one by one, preferably via a switch
at the back of the light head.
As an example, when I light a subject in the studio, I start with one light
source and add lights as needed. I look at the light emitted by the modeling
lights—that is what they are there for, to show you how and where the light
will fall. You can also learn about the light by using different light modifiers—
like changing a softbox out with a 7-inch reflector, straight grid. When you do
so, you’ll see how the light falls and will notice the harsher quality. Stick yourLIGHTING BASICS 61FACING PAGE, TOP—Working with
model Eleya, I had my camera lens
set at f/22, because I’d taken into
account the Sunny 16 Rule, which
states that if you set your camera
shutter speed to the ISO speed and
your lens at f/16, during the bright-
est part of a bright sunny day, your
exposure will be accurate. However,
I had to take into account that Eleya
was standing next to the ocean, and
the water amplified the lighting. As a
result, I needed to increase my aper-
ture by one full stop. One saving
grace, it was a cloudy day and my
camera’s high, flash-sync speed of
(^1) / 200 second still allowed me to
darken the sky by putting my flash at
f/22 on the model (overpowering the
existing light). The final image was
postprocessed in Adobe Photoshop
using Nik Software’s Dynamic Skin
Softener and Bleach Bypass filters.
(CAMERA:Canon EOS 5D with a Canon
70 –200mm f/2.8L IS USM lens. SET-
TINGS:155mm effective focal length,
(^1) / 200 second shutter speed, f/22,
white balance at 6000K, ISO 100)
FACING PAGE, BOTTOM—Here is another
shot of Eleya using the “overpower-
ing the sun with flash” technique.
The final image was post-processed
in Adobe Photoshop using Nik Soft-
ware’s Dynamic Skin Softener and
the Bleach Bypass filters. (CAMERA:
Canon EOS 5D fitted with a Canon
70 –200mm f/2.8L IS USM lens. SET-
TINGS:170mm effective focal length,
(^1) / 160 second shutter speed, f/22,
white balance at 6000K, ISO 100)