Light Studies- How Light Affects a Subject
In photography, placement of light on a subject has a large effect on its appearance. When shooting landscape photography with natural lighting, the location of the sun in the sky can can making a photo of a location on a sunny day look like a completely different area than a photo of that same location on a cloudy day. To explore this, I decided to take a photo from the same vantage point at the base of an East Coast Trail at different times of day over the course of two weeks, and this is what I ended up with.
Blue Light- just after sunrise, around 7am.
Overcast- around 10am on a foggy day.
Front lit- taken when the sun was directly in front of my subject.
High noon sun- taken around noon on a sunny day when the sun was directly overhead.
Side lit- taken when the sun was hitting my subject directly from the side.
Golden light- taken as the sun was setting during golden hour.
Below, I've compiled all 6 photos into a grid. Although these are all the same subject taken from the same vantage point, the type of lighting makes them look completely different. Take for example the rocks in the first photo; they are dark, and blend in with the water. The rocks in the third photo, however, appear almost white, and in the fifth photo, yellow. Same goes for the land- black in the first photo, green in photos two to four, and yellow in the last two photos.
B-Roll
Below are a series of photos, not of my subject from above, that I took when I was out during these various times. I saw a lot of things going on that interested me: seagulls flying around, the ferries bobbing back and forth from Bell Island, a full moon, and my favourite to photograph: the fishermen. There were fishermen fishing off the rocks every time I went down to take photos of my subject, whether it was 7am or 7pm, so I always made sure to take a shot of them.
In conclusion, this study really helped me to gain a deeper understanding of how light affects a subject. I am now able to be a better judge of when to shoot different projects outside and I'm able to gauge what type effect the placement of the sun in the sky will have on the vibe of my shoot.
Thanks for reading!
-Tamara
