Learn How to “See the Light”
Rick Sammon,
www.ricksammon.com

Compare these two photos of a little girl I photographed in a small village near Chitwan National Park in Nepal. The photo on the left was taken in harsh sunlight, where strong sunlight created unflattering shadows on the girl’s face. The photo on the right was taken in the shade, where soft and even lighting created a flattering effect. Learning how to “see the light,” and how it affects our pictures, is of the utmost importance in photography.
(Tech info: Canon EOS 1V, 28-105mm lens, Kodak Elitechrome 100 film)

Technically speaking, when we take a picture, we are recording light on a digital image sensor or piece of film. Before we take a picture, it's important to observe the lighting conditions closely in a scene.

The first step in learning how to see the light is to look for – and be aware of – highlight and shadow areas in a scene.

To digress slightly for a moment.. .

Have you ever hear the term “tone-deafness” to describe a person who can’t tell the difference between musical tones. In photography, we use “value blind” to describe an image that has very little range between light and dark. Ansel Adams used this term. Just as a tone-deaf person cannot tell the difference between tones or musical notes, a value blind viewer doesn’t see the difference in light values (brightness levels) in a scene.

Fortunately, there is hope for the value blind photographer – because we can all learn how to “see the light.”

When we look for the light, we usually want our main subject to be in the highlight area. When we look at a picture, our eye is usually drawn to the brightest part of the scene first. If the main subject is hidden in the shadows or shade, someone looking at the picture may think to himself or herself, "What or where is the main subject?" That's not to say, however, that part of your subject cannot be hidden in the shadows, as in the case of dramatic portraits popular with 1940s movie stars. That technique called for side lighting that darkened part of the subject's face to add a sense of mystery to the image.

Recognizing a scene's highlight and shadow areas, however, is not enough. We must observe the scene's contrast range, that is, the difference between the scene's brightest and darkest areas. If the contrast range is beyond the recordable contrast range of the image sensor or the film, part of the scene will be overexposed or underexposed.

A digital image sensor can record about five stops, as does negative film. Slide film is less forgiving, recording only about three stops. The human eye sees about 11 stops, which gives me a tremendous appreciation for the gift of sight, but can also fool us into thinking that what we see in a scene is what we will capture with our cameras.
If we learn how to compress the scene's contrast range, we can shoot an evenly exposed picture. We can compress or reduce the scene's brightness range in five ways. One, recompose your scene or reposition your subject to eliminate the areas that are too dark or light. Two, use a flash to fill in some of the shadows in a scene. Three, use a graduated filter (dark on one half and gradually becoming clear on the other) to darken the brighter portion of a scene. Four, use a reflector to bounce light onto the dark area of a subject. Five, hold a light diffuser over a subject to soften (or even eliminate) shadows.

Of course, if we can’t compress the scene, we can often use digital darkroom techniques to get a more evenly exposed image – or even an image that looks as it looks to our eyes. We will cover digital enhancements in future columns.
So the next time you look through your camera's viewfinder, think about seeing and recording the light.

Please feel free to email me at RickSammon@aol.com if you have any questions. In fact, I’d appreciate your feedback on my columns.