Single Lamp Lighting & Photography

Series Summary

Photography is the practice of making images by exposing film or another medium to a timed flash of light. The basic equipment used for photography has changed dramatically in the last decades, many people finding digital photography an inexpensive and creative hobby. We use photography as a means of communication worldwide: to sell things, to tell stories, capture memories, evoke passions, fight for causes, make new meanings, and inspire the imagination. Mastering the art of photography is a technical and challenging experience. Even with an automatic, digital camera, one has to learn how to frame a shot, choose a background, interact with the subject, use natural light, and select the right supplies and tools.

In this free video series, pro photographer James Flint gives you the run down of all the basic equipment in a professional photographer's bag of tricks. You will see how to use diffusers, lamps, various flash devices, light measuring tools, cases, tripods, and more. James gives you advice on how to use these tools and also what to look for when buying. You will see how to pick out a digital camera, how to transfer digital pics, and different filters and flash tricks as well. It is all here.

Video Transcript

"When you're shooting indoors, in say your studio, you have numerous options when it comes to lighting. The easiest form of lighting when shooting indoors is to use a single source of light. I have this here which is a strobe light, but it can also be used as a continuous source of light, so using it as one source of light, I'll probably set it as a continuous setting. And you've got a couple of options. Say if I'm going to take a portrait of myself, I could do a front on view with this light, and it will create some interesting effects, and like I said it's the easiest to control. You will get some shadows on the face and this can be good, if you're able to control them how you want. Another effect with a single source of lighting is to come in from the side. This can create more dramatic shadows and it can allow you to do some different things with your images. You can create a bit of a ghostly look from someone or a scary look, depending on how much you want the shadows to go over their face, or again, come back with a straight on view and fill their face with light and show the whole picture. So again, the single source of lighting is what will most resemble daylight because in the daytime we only have light coming from one direction, and it's also the easiest because you're only controlling one light at a time, so there's less room for error and you can really see how the one light affects your subject."