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Shaping Light for Video
in the Age of LEDs
A practical, hands-on guide to lighting for video, this book explores how LEDs are changing the
aesthetics of lighting and provides students with an indispensable guide to the everyday techniques
required to produce professional-quality lighting in the age of LEDs and wireless control options.
The book focuses on first-hand application of technical knowledge, beginning with simple lighting
setups and progressing to more complicated scenarios, and features accompanying diagrams, illustrations
and case studies to demonstrate their real-world application. Key topics covered include basic three-
point lighting, lighting moving actors, set lighting and exposure, instrument selection, bringing style to
your lighting, color temperature and the Kelvin scale, exterior lighting, lighting categories and genres,
green-screen techniques, money and budgeting, and electricity and electrical distribution. The book also
provides guidance on career paths including what a grip does, case studies with photos and diagrams,
and an extensive glossary of set terminology to introduce students to the language of filmmaking.
A must-have resource for film and media production students taking classes in lighting and/or
cinematography.
Alan Steinheimer has 30-plus years of filmmaking experience, with 25 years of lighting as a gaffer and
lighting director in the San Francisco Bay Area. His resume includes feature films such as The Darwin Awards,
documentary and corporate work, commercials, and music videos such as Britney Spears’s Oops, I Did It
Again. He appears regularly as a guest expert in the Meet the Gaffer series on YouTube.
Shaping Light
for Video in the
Age of LEDs
A Practical Guide to the Art
and Craft of Lighting
Second Edition
Alan Steinheimer
Second edition published 2021
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2021 Alan Steinheimer
The right of Alan Steinheimer to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by
him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised
in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or
hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks,
and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
First edition published by Arhus Publishing 2018
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record has been requested for this book
ISBN: 978-0-367-81913-2 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-367-81909-5 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-01079-1 (ebk)
Typeset in Joanna
by Newgen Publishing UK
This book contains information about electricity and electrical equipment designed for the film business. Although
every effort has been made to be as accurate as possible, there is no way for this information to be completely
comprehensive nor a substitute for proper training and professional guidance. The author assumes no responsibility
for misinterpretation of this information or for accidents caused by the misuse of this information.
On the cover: The cover photo is from a corporate lifestyle video segment styled to look like a nightclub or possibly
a music video. It was shot at an employee meeting area and is an example of how lighting can transform a mundane
room into an atmospheric set. Lights used: ARRI S360 in party-color mode on right for an edge light, two S60
SkyPanels for steep key and top light, four Astera Titans positioned in picture, and an ARRI M8 for the bar pattern
on wall. Some solid flags utilized to reduce nearby ambient lights.
Photo by Alan Steinheimer.
Contents
Acknowledgments xii
Introduction 1
1 Why we light 3
The evolution of motion-picture lighting 3
The LED revolution 4
Working with what you have 5
Aspirations and reality 5
2 Lighting basics 6
Three-point lighting 6
Motivated light 6
Key light placement 7
Key light softness 8
Age vs. beauty 11
Lighting test with three subjects 12
Fill and fill light 14
Low fill light 14
Backlight 14
Edge light 15
Eye light 18
Eyeglasses 19
Bald and balding heads 20
Looking for far-side/off-side lighting 21
4 Electricity 35
Electrical basics 35
The mystery of how duplexes were wired 36
Tips on searching for separate circuits in an office setting 36
Tips for searching for circuits in homes 37
Plugs and wires 38
20-amp pin connectors 40
Ohms 40
LEDs rule, tungsten drools 40
Costly trip 41
Running power cords 41
Overall strategies for running power 41
Troubleshooting minor electrical problems 43
9 Background lighting 94
Framing the shot 94
Choosing instruments 95
Single-source lighting 97
Practicals 97
Windows 98
Set design 99
12 HMIs 131
HMI history 131
Safety issues 132
Flicker-free work with HMIs 134
HMI problems 134
HMI summary 136
19 Generators 195
Sizing generators 195
Hertz 195
Balancing the load 196
Generators and sound issues 197
Troubleshooting generators 198
24 Freelancing 231
Scouting and crewing 231
Deal memos 233
Super-sizing the shoot 233
Buying lights vs. renting lights 233
Big-picture thoughts 234
Career paths 235
20 reasons to love and hate freelancing 236
A code for freelancers 238
Acknowledgments
Many people provided valuable insights for this project. I would like to thank the following individuals:
• Thanks to my partner Dawn for all the encouragement and for posing at below minimum wages.
• Rick Siegel in NYC for giving me my first production job.
• Nick Despota in San Francisco for helping me restart my career here.
• Len Levine for bringing me on my first big feature films.
• David Claessen for trusting me to do bigger jobs in Los Angeles.
• Brent Cyr, Charles Griswold, and Ernie Kunze for being the best Best boys I could have ever imagined.
• Jan Seerveld and Dave Bolick for copy-editing.
• Luke Seerveld for his ongoing encouragement, for sharing work and clients over the years, and for
including me in his Meet the Gaffer series on YouTube.
• Joseph Seif for his contribution on ACES Color.
• Frieder Hochheim for his insight into LED color.
• Tyler McPherron for the illustrated drawings.
Introduction
Lighting for video production, like most other technical skills, is best learned by doing. This book is
designed for those of you who want to do lighting, not simply study it. To this end I have designed the
book chapters as a series of lessons that enable a beginner to start to improve their lighting proficiency as
quickly as possible.
This book also covers technical elements of lighting that apply to more advanced students. These topics
are placed later in the book so that a beginner doesn’t have to struggle through dense material such as
large electrical distribution before getting started with basic lighting setups. The reader of this book
doesn’t need to become an expert; it may be that he or she just wants a good working understanding of
how lighting works and the everyday terminology. Many of the camerapersons and directors I work with
leave most of the nitty-gritty lighting decisions to me after a brief discussion of the basic parameters.
The lighting process always goes more smoothly after opinions and viewpoints have been discussed,
especially those of the director and director of photography (DP). My work as a gaffer is to implement
their vision, and clear communication helps me understand that vision and translate their ideas into
an actual plan. One of the major obstacles for student productions is creating an organized period of
collaboration; it takes time to learn how to communicate quickly and efficiently and develop a game plan.
The LED (Light Emitting Diode) revolution in lighting has arrived. The ease-of-use factor has eclipsed
tungsten lighting on smaller shoots and is making steady inroads into smaller HMI usage. Kino Flo
fluorescent technology is holding out as a cheaper alternative to LEDs, but as a company Kino Flo is
pushing hard into the LED world and no doubt envisions a future dominated by their new LED product
lines. Some readers may wonder why I even bother to cover the gamut of tungsten instruments. I would
answer that there is still residual value in learning how to use tungsten as covered in this book:
• College and high school classes continue to use tungsten lights.
• Most stage shoots, especially larger ones, still rely on tungsten for cost savings as well as a superior
scalability.
• As LED usage surges, tungsten rental rates become more negotiable. You can purchase used tungsten
lights very cheaply.
• The wide variety of tungsten luminaires created over the past 100 years offer a huge selection of
specialized solutions that LEDs may never address. There may never be a 5K Skypan LED equivalent.
• Tungsten still has a great CRI (Color Rendering Index), color consistency between different fixtures,
and tungsten fixtures are easy to own and repair.
• Tungsten lights are literally available across the globe; if you want to learn the principles of lighting
these are the easiest lights to access.
• In the beginning it is more important to light with whatever is at hand; you can gradually finesse your
lighting technique and later improve upon actual instrument selection.
2 | Introduction
I use a lot of LED lighting in my current work and consequently LED instruments are in many of my
lighting plots in this book. The Case Studies in Chapter 25 are presented in chronological order so you
may notice the creeping increase of LED usage. Keep in mind that video production in general and
lighting in particular is the art of the possible. If your biggest instrument is a 4’ x 4 Kino Flo then that
will be your key light. Make it happen with what you have available; don’t pine for lights you can’t afford.
Words in bold are listed in the glossary and may be in bold again when they reappear in a later chapter.
Italics denote an ordinary word that has become part of the set vocabulary and may have a non-standard
English meaning. There is a language to making films, and since time is of the essence on set, you need
to learn the vocabulary to communicate ideas quickly. Some terms embody the irreverence and history
of the business so it can be fun to learn the language of filmmaking. Like other aspects of filmmaking,
lighting is an art, a craft, and a business. Successful lighting is the result of deliberative minds working
together. It is this collaboration that makes filmmaking so fascinating.
CHAPTER ONE
Why we light
Today’s video cameras are so fast that it is entirely possible to shoot in true vérité style with available
light. For some documentaries, in which lighting would be too intrusive, this is a major breakthrough.
However, most productions can still benefit from some sort of lighting design sensibility. To put it bluntly,
many YouTube videos look like crap. Even the most intriguing, witty, outrageous, and engaging video
loses its impact if it has poor lighting.
Designing lighting draws you into the craft, art, and science of film and video making. It is a marriage
of aesthetics to practicality. Controlling light for the purpose of capturing images has a long history.
Leonardo da Vinci and his camera obscura were the likely origins of photographic reproduction. Although
da Vinci described the camera obscura in a notebook in 1502, the first know public drawing was
published in 1545.
Fast-forward to the twenty-first century, and you will find an enormous variety of visual imagery,
carefully designed and presented to sell products and viewpoints, and to tell stories. Nowadays I see great
lighting in all genres. HBO, Netflix and Amazon have pushed out even the artistic boundaries of the TV
series.
I love the intersection of aesthetics and machinery. My goal in this book is to share techniques, practical
tips, workplace philosophy, and terminology for manipulating light to create images. My intent is
to present lighting concepts in digestible chunks to allow production personnel to tool up for more
intelligent and consciously designed lighting.
Several years ago I might have included “film” in the title of this book, but I haven’t lit a film set in years.
Video cameras have replaced film cameras even in major movie productions. The theory and techniques
are still the same, so if you’re looking for film lighting know-how, everything you’ll read here still
applies. Film lighting precedes video by 50–60 years. The apprentice-based learning style that dominated
film production worked well for film shoots, but when the TV age began it was too inflexible for the
multiple levels of quality inherent in video production. Filmmaking no longer requires actual film, as
evidenced by director Steve Soderbergh recently shooting an entire feature on a phone.
Think of filmmaking as a medium with a specific language and nearly infinite range of methods for
conveying mood and content through lighting. Hollywood features use lighting to enhance feeling and
story line, elevating ordinary life into a symbolic drama of the human condition. Like any language you
can continue to improve your lexicon and add to your bag of techniques. Every single production day
calls for finding the lighting style best suited to your available equipment, overall aesthetic, available crew,
and the time given to create it.
4 | Why we light
Figure 1.1 The oldest-known published drawing of a camera obscura from 1545 showing how to
study a solar eclipse.
T he LED revolution
The first LEDs were prone to a green tint, which wasn’t great for skin tones. Many commercial LEDs
in buildings and cheaper, older film LED lights still exhibit a green tint. But now on my average shoot
75% of the instruments are LED, and some are 100%. On the issue of accurate color rendition most DPs
(Directors of Photography) have come to accept a 92+ CRI (Color Rendering Index) as acceptable. The
main impediment for beginners is the cost: LEDs cost more to buy and to rent. Lesser-known brands such
as Westcott, Aputure, Dracast, and Fiilex are starting to fill out product lines that hit a “prosumer” middle-
market price. Old-line companies such as ARRI, Mole, Lite Panels, Cineo, LiteGear, Dedo, and Astera will
continue to put out the expensive top of the line products I prefer. Are these lights better? Generally yes,
but like in other areas of film production you might be paying 50% more for the final 10% improvement
factor. I buy and use top-end lights such as ARRI because my upper-end corporate clients expect it and are
willing to pay for it. There are other solutions, and some of them are not even LEDs, so don’t despair if
you are a student still eating Top Ramen regularly.
Why we light | 5
If there is a Zen aspect to lighting for filmmaking it is all about making do with what equipment you
have available. Lots of LEDs? –great! A box of Kinos –make the film magic with those fixtures. I lit
many sets for 15+ years with Kino Flos. I still do tungsten shoots on stages; daylight stage shoots are
prohibitively expensive unless it is a small set.
If you are a student get familiar with whatever lights are accessible. Resist the temptation to buy too early.
Better to try out a variety of luminaires and find what works best. When you are working on student
productions or indie projects never pay list price, instead haggle and make offers. Even with 30 years in
filmmaking I am still regularly making deals. This art form is one of the most expensive to produce.
Even the film crews working on masterpieces such as Gone with the Wind (1939), Blade Runner (1982), and
the Terminator series probably had moments of “what the heck are we doing?” Behind every great vision
there is some gritty reality to get a film made. Try to harmonize the vision of art with the money and gear
available. Some of the best short films I have seen were brilliantly simple:
• A student film in New York City consisting of a continual loop of a man’s hands washing with soap
with a voice-over rationalizing his money-grubbing real estate schemes and victim-blaming the
people he was evicting to make way for higher rents.
• A video short by well-known dog photographer William Wegman with his Weimaraner Man Ray. The
camera is on the ground facing a tall glass of milk, the dog enters frame, and quickly starts drinking.
Towards the end his tongue becomes unbelievably elongated. The dog finally knocks the glass over and
finishes off the spilled milk. It embodied the striving for food and ridiculous nature of our rush for
satisfaction while providing some entertaining comic relief.
On occasion I am hired on student productions, which are characterized by two common features: too
much ambition and too little collaboration. Often one or two strong personalities drive the entire
enterprise, which can lead to train wrecks and failed projects. The great joy of film production is
collaboration. It takes years to master the art of contributing without too much ego, and being able to
absorb the flow and direction of a production and improve upon it.
There are popular buzzwords and trends that can enslave you –beware! There is no need to shoot 4k for
an indie YouTube video. You don’t need LED lights on every shoot. Dolly moves on track are expensive;
Dana dolly moves are cheap. Learn to innovate and above all work with what you have. Keep your dreams
but keep an eye on reality and realize that every film is a compromise. When I read Masters of Light (1984,
2013) about feature DPs I was struck by how many times they said they had to improvise and make do
even though millions of dollars were being spent for the production!
Remember your first thought or plan may not be the best one. Practice collaboration and find like-
minded people to populate your sets. Adjust the scope of production to the budget and the gear
available. Make the compromises needed to finish the project and you’ll have started on a long career in
filmmaking.
For a sobering view of what can go wrong on movie sets every student should watch Burden of Dreams
(1982) by Les Blank about the making of Fitzcarraldo (1982), as well as Hearts of Darkness (1991) and Lost in
La Mancha (2002).
CHAPTER TWO
Lighting basics
As human beings, our interactions with each other revolve around interpreting facial expressions and
understanding the complex emotions they reveal. Therefore, it’s no surprise that lighting human faces is
crucial to controlling the aesthetics and impact of your production. When you look at most TV and film,
you will find a large percentage of scenes are devoted to close-ups of people’s faces. Learning how to light
faces effectively is the lighting student’s first priority. Fortunately this task can be accomplished with only
a few basic pieces of equipment.
The most basic soup of lighting has three lights: key, fill, and backlight. A more modern interpretation of
the troika might swap edge light for the backlight. The key light is usually defined as the brightest light
falling on the subject’s head or on an object in product lighting. Occasionally the backlight or edge light
can be the brightest light depending on the desired effect, e.g., in a dramatic or feature film as opposed
to a straightforward interview scenario. For the moment, however, we’ll discuss lighting for an ordinary
talking head (an interview subject or spokesperson). In two simple diagrams (figs. 2.5 and 2.35) you
can see that the key light, backlight, and edge light have zones of possible positions. There is no one spot
that is perfect; every interview subject is unique and the mood and intent of the film will dictate lighting
as much as the actual physical skull and hair of the talking head.
Often the location of the key light is dictated by the set location. There may be physical limitations on the
placement of lights or you may need to consider motivating sources. Often we swap the key side when
shooting a collection of interviews just to introduce variety to the framing and avoid repetition.
In most interviews the key light is the brightest light and thus usually the brightest or biggest luminaire.
Frequently the key is diffused and softened to render a more pleasing portraiture. One of my go-to key
lights is a ARRI SkyPanel S120-C (12” x 51”) behind an 8’ x 8’ full grid. I can roll the S120 behind the
diffusion to find the spot I like. In previous years I might have used a 4’ x 4 Kino Flo or Kino Flo Image
80 behind a similar diffusion. I usually have at least a 4’ x 4 diffusion in front of the key and often a
larger diffusion. A soft key almost universally makes faces look better and more handsome or pretty.
My first lighting kit comprised three Lowel D-heads and two 650w Omni lights. The only diffusion I could
muster was 1’ x 1’ diffusion on the barndoors. It was a fairly hard light and I shudder now at the thought.
Bouncing harder lights off white or walls is a possible choice, but in general bounce light requires more
grip equipment to control and it is often simpler for novices to place key lights behind diffusion.
M otivated light
Motivated light is the second holy tenet of lighting after soft-key light for faces. If you read Masters of Light
(Dennis Schaefer and Larry Salvato, 2013, University of California Press) it is one of the most common
Lighting basics | 7
themes with all the DPs. In essence, if you see a light or a source of light in the frame such as a window,
that gives you a motivating reason to place a movie light to simulate (fake) light coming from that
source. In simpler terms, if you see a large window on the right side of frame you might want to place
the key on the right side to suggest that the source of lighting is the window. Of course the actual source
is your movie light, which is far more controllable both in terms of light level as well as placement. With
the exception of some dark dramas and superhero movies, modern filmmaking is all about motivated
lighting. Many DPs will ask the art department to help out with a lamp or create a window in a wall to
provide the inspirational source.
There are nuances to the interpretation. If you see a window way deep in the scene that might motivate
an edge light but you might also justify a key from that side as if there is a whole bank of windows there
just out of sight. Why not use the window light? Invariably by the time you adjust the f/stop for the
window there may not be enough actual foot-candles of light on the talent.
Certainly one of the first conversations while collaborating on an interview setup is where to place the
key light and is there a justifiable motivating source? There is no hard and fast rule; just a consideration.
Let’s examine three-point lighting in more detail.
K ey light placement
Is the person looking into camera or off-camera at the interviewer or at another actor?
If off-camera, the traditional approach is to place the key light on the off-side, broadly illuminating the
cheek that is farther from camera (see figs. 2.1 and 2.2) An easy way to remember this is to put the key
on the same side as the interviewer or the other facing actor. I follow this rule 80–90 percent of the time
when lighting faces.
Look at these two images carefully. The off-side key offers better modeling on the subject’s face and is
more aesthetically pleasing. This concept is one of the most important in lighting faces for video and stills.
There are exceptions to the rule, such as a strongly motivated source seen on the other side, issues with
glasses and reflections, physical limitations of a room, etc., but in most cases I place the key light on the
off-side (aka far-side key).
Figure 2.1 Off-side key. Note the Figure 2.2 Overhead diagram of off-side key.
key light is on the same
side as the off-camera
interviewer.
8 | Lighting basics
K ey light softness
Faces generally look better with softer light, which spreads the light source over a larger area. A bare
Fresnel light or open-face light (also described as specular light) is hard light, epitomized by the
high-contrast style of film noir. At the other extreme, celebrity-style lighting is diffused and has
more wrap (coverage) around the nose, and often improves a face’s attractiveness, contributing to an
impression of beauty and/or honesty. When dramas call for harsh lighting you can skip the diffusion
and let the lighting reveal wrinkles and weathered skin. I suspect that little or no diffusion was used
for Clint Eastwood’s early westerns, for example, where emphasizing the texture of his beard stubble
was a plus.
The key light is usually elevated 30–45° off the ground. Key lights set at head height have a slightly
unnatural feel, as if there’s a low window nearby or light from an artificial source such as a lamp or TV.
Low keys are used much more in drama. They’re often more ominous and can create a feeling of existing
Lighting basics | 9
Figure 2.5 Typical key zones: 30° to 45° away from camera and elevated 30° to 60° above the
subject’s head. These are not mandatory, just common parameters.
10 | Lighting basics
Figure 2.6
Consider the merits of a soft-key light. What exactly is soft light? To some degree, it’s
a relative value. The farther it is from the subject, the harder the light becomes even
when the source is big (picture the very large sun and the hard shadow at noon).
A smaller source close to the subject may have the same softness as a larger source
farther back. There’s no real science to this –this illustration shows some rough
equivalencies.
in an artificial man-made environment. When the bounce light is big and soft from down low it can feel
more like sunshine.
The traditional or textbook key light creates an inverted triangle of light on the opposite cheek from
the key side. This is easier to discern with hard light, but we usually light portraits with soft light, so
you might as well get used to seeing the inverted triangle as a fuzzy patch of light (see Fig 2.7). When
portraiture subjects are over age 40, you’ll see more lines, even with a soft light, especially around the
mouth and neck. If your intention is to eliminate every visible wrinkle (as in glamour lighting), then the
key should probably be soft and right over camera. For years, fashion photographers have shot top models
with bounce light umbrellas or soft boxes right over the lens. In fig. 2.8 you can see the key light moved
over camera.
Lighting basics | 11
Every face reacts to light differently, so although there are basic rules, you’ll need to probe gently each
time you light a new face. This will help you figure out what lighting best suits the mood and general
level of attractiveness desired, and how to imbue the shot with a pleasing aesthetic.
Ultimately, you have to weigh practicality into making decisions about how big and soft a key needs
to be. Consider the action area, amount of space available to position lights, desired softness for the
subject, required f-stop, available fixtures, available diffusion, psychological space for the subject to feel
comfortable, etc. In our lighting test on the following pages (figs. 2.9–2.32) note how all three faces have
the exact same lighting but each has a different feel. You have to find what works with each face. Skin
color, complexion, hair, glasses, and clothing all factor into the final result.
12 | Lighting basics
Figure 2.9, 2.10, 2.11 Subject looking into camera lens. Key light over camera.
Figure 2.12, 2.13, 2.14 Subject looking off-camera right. Key light off-camera 15°.
Figure 2.27, 2.28, 2.29 Key light off-camera 45°, plus fill, plus edge light.
Figure 2.30, 2.31, 2.32 Key light 45°, plus fill, plus edge light, plus backlight.
14 | Lighting basics
The expression fill light or “fill” is commonly used as a category: it can range from an actual luminaire,
often bouncing into a card, to a small or large passive fill card. Fill light is used to reduce the darker
areas on set, especially as applied to lighting faces. It is generally located near camera to avoid creating
additional shadows. Decide how much fill light is necessary to fill the shadow side of the face. This could
be negative fill (for example a 4’ x 4’ solid floppy unfolded to make a 4’ x 8’ black duvetyne solid);
nothing (but keep in mind nearby walls may contribute bounced fill light); a small, passive white fill
card; a larger white card; or adding another light to control the contrast ratio of the face. Softer is better
so as not to contribute secondary shadows. In my experience the range of applicable lighting styles is far
narrower for talking heads selling products than for drama. Advertisers want bright, happy faces hawking
their goods. However, I have noticed that the more technical and abstract the product (networking, cloud
services, etc.) the greater the allowance for a bit of drama in portrait lighting; in high-tech interviews, we
often use little to no fill.
L ow fill light
Sometimes low fill light from underneath is appropriate, especially when you are using a top center key
light. Certain DPs I work with will often ask for a passive low fill, especially for women, to help flatten
out the age lines under the chin. I tend not to do this in a documentary situation because it is fairly
intrusive for the person being videotaped. In the past for low fill I often used showcard with its matte
white surface, but now I have 18” x 24” and 2 ’x 3’ Ultrabounce whites that are easier to adjust with a
low C-stand.
B acklight
Decide whether backlight is needed. Unless you have a cubicle wall immediately behind your subject,
this is often the most challenging light to place. The classic approach places backlighting about 30–60°
above the horizon, in line with the camera and subject. This often means hanging the light over an empty
space. Some options include: putting up a ceiling scissor clamp for the light if you have a drop ceiling,
using a menace arm, goal-posting a piece of pipe, spring-clipping a showcard for a bounce surface, etc.
Lighting basics | 15
This complicates things and slows down the production, often requiring someone skilled enough to
make the hanging light safe. Many camerapersons scorn the backlight as old-fashioned, but I find it useful
to pop the subject from the background, or to add dimensionality to the head by delineating the subject’s
hair. Backlighting can be subtle; not necessarily the heavy-handed techniques of TV talk shows or news.
One modification of the backlight that I use for men in suits is to slow down the light on their hair.
I place a 2’ x 3’ silk shelving it (placing parallel to the ground), making it work only on the top of the
subject’s head, softening the light on the subject’s hair while allowing the full beam to rim their suit. The
suit is almost always a darker shade, and the soft cut of the 2’ x 3’ silk puts a glow on the head, while
allowing all the light to fall on their shoulders/dark suit to define it from the background (see fig. 2.42).
Traditionally, small Fresnel lights have been used for backlighting, but I find that bigger soft sources, such
as a 4’ x 4 Kino Flo with #216 or #129 diffusion on the doors, or a Litemat 4+ with the heavy Chimera
white/Magic Cloth diffusion, produces a more subtle backlight that wraps around the sides of the head
a bit and glows. In the few instances where I’ve used a Fresnel for backlight, I’m often spotting it in on
the subject’s shoulders and wire down (put metal scrims in the light to reduce the output) the light for
correct exposure. A little bit dribbles onto the hair, but mostly it delineates the shoulders. I just don’t like
a lot of hard backlight on hair; it looks like TV news.
On a bigger set I super-size not only the key to allow for greater movement but also the backlight.
Sometimes a 4’ x 8’ sheet of foamcore rigged up high behind the subject as a bounce, with a couple of
PAR 64 cans with MFL bulbs or a Joker HMI PAR if in daylight, gives a similar glow (see figs. 2.38 and
2.40). It’s much easier and quicker to rig a card up high than a light. With the light on the ground, I can
quickly spot or flood, then wire down if there’s too much light.
E dge light
Edge light: also known as rim light, aka kicker, aka liner, and aka scratch. As befits a light with so many
names, the edge has many variations and much personality. The edge light has also replaced the more
traditional backlight for many DPs, as it feels more modern and natural. An edge light can be on either
side of the head or on both sides, but it often lands on the fill side, opposite the key, where you see
it more.
The classic portraiture approach places the edge light approximately 45° off the back edge of the subject.
Although the edge light is occasionally raised up, I find it most effective at head height. It can be soft or
hard. In the past I’ve used vertical Kino Flos for the edge, but now I use LEDs, such as an Astra through
2’ x 3’ diffusion, an ARRI SkyPanel S-30, or Kino Flo Freestyle 31, because the LED dimming function
makes the fine-tuning go faster. It is best adjusted by eye, preferably with the DP or myself at camera
or monitor. Even small movements can make a huge difference –how shiny the subject’s skin, whether
their hair is shading the cheek from the edge light, how much the head moves or turns, and so on –all
of these impact the net effect. This light frequently needs more time to finesse, and even after 25 years
I find myself searching for the perfect placement. In addition to the option of no edge light, you can also
choose to have one or two edge lights. This is mostly a question of taste and style: you can rationalize the
decision, but there really aren’t any rules beyond whatever is needed to create a harmonious composition.
Of course, motivational sources in the background such as windows, lamps, bright walls, etc., can all be
good reasons to use an edge light. An edge light can also contribute to the sense of dimensionality or
“3D-ness” of the subject.
Sometimes it’s easier to see the edge light and fine-tune it if you turn off the key and fill, so you can
see exactly where the edge light is landing. To adjust intensity, you’ll have to turn those lights back on.
Needless to say this is a lot easier to accomplish with two people. This technique is especially helpful
when trying to keep the edge light off the nose.
16 | Lighting basics