I have a general question. The area in the southwest is pretty open. meaning it is generally clear skies and the like. I have several ideas for textrures and soon will have my new camera(any second or minute). What I generally have difficulties is making use of what light theirISavialable. I mean it in a way that alot of the times I can not go out early in the mornings or late in the afternoon. Should I just not shoot unless of the lighting is good? Or is their some types of things I might beable to get away with like moving the subject to create my own raking light but with the sky still straight up?
I think I already know the answer but will see if I am correct.
Would this be a good example of vertical raking light? It was taken today around 130pm in a Confederate Cemetery. (i dont know how to make thumbnails in the forum, i hope this works)
//www.dpchallenge.com/image.php?IMAGE_ID=203827
The light is a given at any paricular moment. Be aware of when you want to be somewhere, but whenever and wherever you happen to be, be aware of the light that is. Certainly you can move moveable things to orient them correctly, but there aren't that many moveable things that make a difference in anything but closeup photography.
Bascially, when you can't explore texture as a strong component of your image, you're left with color to handle the emotion alone. Photographing in the Southwest in flat light means paying particular attention to color intensity and value. Your best friends are your polarizer and your hue/sat adjustment layer. You can frequently bring up remarkable color that is "realler than real" if you use these tools lovingly.
Would this be a good example of vertical raking light? It was taken today around 130pm in a Confederate Cemetery. (i dont know how to make thumbnails in the forum, i hope this works)
//www.dpchallenge.com/image.php?IMAGE_ID=203827
To attach thumbnails, open your image and copy from the url bar the image number alone. In this case it is 203827. Then enclose it in "thumb" tags as follows, but omitting the spaced between the brackets and the number: [ thumb ]203827[ /thumb ]: like so:
.
As to your question, the shot presents as more of a blend of strong light and back light than it does as raking light. It might, for example, show more as raking light if the sun were high in the upper left corner and the rays of it paralleled the face, revealing texture there.
Would this be a good example of vertical raking light? It was taken today around 130pm in a Confederate Cemetery. (i dont know how to make thumbnails in the forum, i hope this works)
//www.dpchallenge.com/image.php?IMAGE_ID=203827
I also had a question about B&W photography and do you treat the lighting the same way as we have in the lessons with color?
I am really into B&W..and I constantly use Shadow/Midtone/Hightlight adjustments. It seems that we would still use lighting in the same manner.
In general, yes, light is light. But in B/W we rely on varying tonalities to carry information that color might otherwise carry in a full-spectrum image. One way to acquire informational tonality is via texture, so in B/W photography we need to be even more aware of the way the light is painting the surfaces, and the awareness is less intuitive.
In other words, our awareness of textural qualities is often subsumed by our greater awareness of color subtleties, and we find that B/W versions of certain images are lacking something. The thing they lack is usually "light" in the positive sense of its tangible contribution to expressing the "reality" of the thing being imaged.
It's hard for me to express. In a nutshell, at least as far as producing better-than-decent images goes, awareness of light-made-manifest is more critical to B/W photography than it is to color photography, although when you get up to the rarefied plane of seeking absolute perfection in a given image the needs are similar.
In the examples showing all three lights, it seems ocean and sky presented better (to my taste) with flat light, and terra firma looked better with rake lighting. Backlighting without a subject up close tends to wash out details in everything. My 2c.
Re Blanton's flower, I think it's effective because the sides of the flower that are in shadow, are in "light" shadow and so we can see more detail on the surfaces than we could if we were looking at strong light. I've been struggling with the difference between raking and strong light, but, I guess the main difference is that the shadows in raking light aren't as dark and we can see more of the detail/texture of the subject. Am I getting it right?
Re Blanton's flower, I think it's effective because the sides of the flower that are in shadow, are in "light" shadow and so we can see more detail on the surfaces than we could if we were looking at strong light. I've been struggling with the difference between raking and strong light, but, I guess the main difference is that the shadows in raking light aren't as dark and we can see more of the detail/texture of the subject. Am I getting it right?
Correct, as far as it goes. The "main" difference is that between raking and strong lights, raking light breaks up what would be the shadowed area into elements of light and shadow, revealing texture. The overall effect is indeed one of less-dense shadows, but in reality the areas that ARE shadow will still be basically just as dark.
I don't know if Blanton achieved his effect with fill light or with curves adjustment in post-processing. The fill light, if that's what it is, isn't necessarily somethign he "added"; it's just as likely that the environment itself was reflecting light back into the shadows.
Robt.
Addendum; note that a significant portion of this image is actually backlit, effectively, but the defining characteristic of the light here is that it is "raking", in the sense that it limns the soft, curving edges of the petals very effectively.
The "main" difference is that between raking and strong lights, raking light breaks up what would be the shadowed area into elements of light and shadow, revealing texture.
Okay, that's very helpful. Thanks.
Originally posted by bear_music:
but in reality the areas that ARE shadow will still be basically just as dark.
Okay, so, the areas that ARE shadow from raking light are just as dense as shadows from stong light. Is that what you're saying? If so, I get it. Thanks much! :)
but in reality the areas that ARE shadow will still be basically just as dark.
Okay, so, the areas that ARE shadow from raking light are just as dense as shadows from stong light. Is that what you're saying? If so, I get it. Thanks much! :)
Basically, yes. The APPEARANCE of the shadow areas tends to be softer because they are broken up by more light areas. Also, it is true that many times, depending on the texture involved, the part of the texture that is reflecting light bounces it into the shadow areas so there is, in effect, a little fill light for each shadow and in that case the shadows actually WILL be measurably less dense. But this is not always the case.
The first immediate thing that popped into my mind when looking at rblanton's flower is that it has a VERY distinct three dimensional component. In other words it has depth. The directionality of the light makes your mind work with your eye to convert the two dimensional flat image into what the photographer saw when he snapped the shot. Excellent choice of subjects for this assignment!
The first immediate thing that popped into my mind when looking at rblanton's flower is that it has a VERY distinct three dimensional component. In other words it has depth. The directionality of the light makes your mind work with your eye to convert the two dimensional flat image into what the photographer saw when he snapped the shot. Excellent choice of subjects for this assignment!
If my understanding is correct, this should serve as an example of backlight acting as raking light...
Comments?
No, that's pure backlighting; what you're 'seeing" as "raking light" is actually refracted light, specular reflections off the sea's surface. But backlighting and raking light often are very closely related. Basically, technically speaking, you get "raking light" when the light's at a 90-degree angle, more or less, to the shooting axis. To qualify as true raking light you have to see the "lit" side of the thing, and in this case all you see is the shadow side plus the refractions.
No, that's pure backlighting; what you're 'seeing" as "raking light" is actually refracted light, specular reflections off the sea's surface. But backlighting and raking light often are very closely related. Basically, technically speaking, you get "raking light" when the light's at a 90-degree angle, more or less, to the shooting axis. To qualify as true raking light you have to see the "lit" side of the thing, and in this case all you see is the shadow side plus the refractions.
Robt.
Dang, then I still gotta try and do my assignment. :-P When you say shooting axis, do you meann a line drawn from the center of the camera sensor that goes out the center of the lens extending to your subject? Or in other words, the light should be coming from hard left or hard right?
No, that's pure backlighting; what you're 'seeing" as "raking light" is actually refracted light, specular reflections off the sea's surface. But backlighting and raking light often are very closely related. Basically, technically speaking, you get "raking light" when the light's at a 90-degree angle, more or less, to the shooting axis. To qualify as true raking light you have to see the "lit" side of the thing, and in this case all you see is the shadow side plus the refractions.
Robt.
Dang, then I still gotta try and do my assignment. :-P When you say shooting axis, do you meann a line drawn from the center of the camera sensor that goes out the center of the lens extending to your subject? Or in other words, the light should be coming from hard left or hard right?
Technically, yes. But we don't have to be that literal. For our purposes the light can be coming from any direction so long as it nearly parallels the "raked face" of the object it's hitting.
Technically, yes. But we don't have to be that literal. For our purposes the light can be coming from any direction so long as it nearly parallels the "raked face" of the object it's hitting.
As some of you may be aware, I've taken on co-mentorship of "lanscape/Scenery" with gi_joe, because I was asked to do so. He and i discussed merging the groups, as they have a LOT of overlap in terms of what can be covered (natural light, after all, is THE tool for landscape work), but we decided on a slightly different approach:
Effective immediately, we will consider all members of one group a member of the other. Keep an eye on both if you're interested in landscape work, and feel free to participate in the other. As we progress in this group, we'll be moving into some areas that have nothing to do with landscape, such as macros, interior work, whatever seems appropriate (always from a lighting POV of course), so there will be some divergence in the goals of the groups.
I'm thinking that the outside of the right half of the shell demonstrates raking light as some of it is in shadow and some is lit, while the inside is the lit/flat side. Good or bad example?
As some of you may be aware, I've taken on co-mentorship of "lanscape/Scenery" with gi_joe, because I was asked to do so. He and i discussed merging the groups, as they have a LOT of overlap in terms of what can be covered (natural light, after all, is THE tool for landscape work), but we decided on a slightly different approach:
Effective immediately, we will consider all members of one group a member of the other. Keep an eye on both if you're interested in landscape work, and feel free to participate in the other. As we progress in this group, we'll be moving into some areas that have nothing to do with landscape, such as macros, interior work, whatever seems appropriate (always from a lighting POV of course), so there will be some divergence in the goals of the groups.
Robt.
I have been watching that thread as well as a number of others. These mentorships are such a smorgasbord of info it's kinda hard to take it all in. I have been thinking that these two groups shold have been one since the get go, so this comes as no surprise to me.
here's my example of raking light, well as much as I could get on a rainy day inside....
Today has been a GOOD picture day.
I trusted the camera, and came out with pictures that amaze me, even if they don't everyone else :)
As I was looking through them, trying to consider the different types of light, I think this one shows raking (or what I understood it to be) It's more vertical than horizontal. The sun was hgsigh and just behind him which made the shadows show off the fluff of his neck and lay of his wings.
I did have a couple that were better, but they made it into a challenge and I don't THINK anyone will be able to recognize them as mine. My daughter is no where in site! :)
