articles/Lighting/filllight-page5

What, No Fill Light? - part 5 of 1 2 3 4 5 6

Published 01/04/2010

Image No. 9, demonstrates how the strip bank boxes provide fullfigure illumination with even coverage without flooding the subject with light, while providing a nice rim-light effect to the opposite side of the form light.

An argument for larger soft boxes is twofold.

One is that the larger the box, the softer the light. Second is that when photographing either children or large groups, a larger box provides better coverage. But this argument is a little flawed because although a large box will provide greater coverage for groups, the coverage is not truly even and needs to be supplemented with equally large fill lights.

Profile lighting is often the subject of debate and photographers use varied lighting techniques to create profile images. Some prefer such images to be somewhat flat, similar to image No. 10. While this is quite nice, it lacks depth and the facial features are not rendered adequately. The form light, nevertheless, still provides a little light to the side of the face not exposed to the camera. This almost creates a rim effect.

The issue of photographing children (who move around the set) needing greater coverage because you cannot be sure where they will be at any given moment is just as easily covered with a strip bank. This is because when the subject is not in the ideal spot we ought not be pressing the shutter.

An alternate to the large soft box is a bank of two strip banks. That is a subject for another article.

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1st Published 01/04/2010
last update 09/12/2022 14:54:13

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What, No Fill Light? - part 5 of 1 2 3 4 5 6