History of Portrait Lighting
zeitgeist
ago, they weren't considered photographers, they were
artists and most of them were trained in fine arts.
Portrait painters of the day were very topical people on the
order of magnitude of famous film directors are today.
Their exhibits and gallery opennings, as well as competative
salons were covered by newspaper critics as importantly as
feature films are discussed in the entertainment and social
pages, papers would send two to cover a major show with pro
and con view points. Society types would sit for portraits
not so much because they needed to cover a bare wall but to
be part of the action. It was as though you could
commission a part in a TV show.
Photography was merely a fascinating technique with many
detractors in both the tacky slavishness to reality and the
denegration of it's imperfections. One complained that a
lens to be considered sharp should resolve the reflection of
the scenery in the catch light in the subject's eye.
Portraits were originally lit by large northlight windows
as practiced by leading painters of the day. These were
usually in upstairs studios with a large room, the window
was slanted in a few degrees and sometimes the room was
designed to angle the window about 30' towards the subjects
though typically the light was from 90' it was still soft
enough to wrap around and give enough detail to the shadowed
side.
I'm not sure what the ISO rating of the films of the day
were but exposures were measured in minutes, the subject's
heads held in a brace. A portrait was very expensive, a
month's salary for a working man.
But years went by, costs came down some and things got a
little more competative. The labourers and assistants saw
how easy it was, how cool it was, and how eager the public
was for pictures that they didn't need fine arts training to
learn posing and lighting, they just rented a store front
and had people lining up. NOrthlight windows were hard to
come by, landlords didn't like their buildings altered, and
it was hard to get light on a street front shop where the
action was. However it was discovered that an electrical
charge arcing across two metal contacts made a significantly
bright light. It was harsh, a tiny point of light and cast
a sharp shadow that you couldn't see anything in. So they
put a second one up on the other side. Later things things
improved, some guy had invented incandescent bulbs and
municiple power. Spot lights with condenser lenses to
really blast a lot of light onto the subject came about.
Parabolic reflectors were a cheaper alternative and softer
sorta. You could hide one in the rafters and put a glow on
the hair and give some separation. Some guys in the movie
industry noted that a really strong light on one side could
alter the apparent shape of a face. (and no, not by melting
some off.)
As film got faster, lenses got larger, lights got brighter
other techniques came available to improve the quality of
light. Softer flood lights, barndoors and feathering,
flagging, light banks of multiple floodlights.
Studio portrait photography reached a plattou in the 30's,
just about everything you could do with hot lights and the
various modifiers of practical use were in use.
Photo-journalism was coming into its own with such miniature
cameras like rolli's. Though that was derided by serious
wedding photographers who only shot with a 4x5 speed
graphic. However, even they would piggyback a stereo
realist camera with dual sync to sell color views as an add
on.
Color photography really shook up the portrait world, many
of the tried and true techniques flopped. The multiple
keys and crossed fills that made a mono image crisp and
sparkly made a color image seem jarring, the subjects
greasy. Larger parabolic floods, with light caps to block
the direct rays from the bulb to give a larger softer light,
silver barn doors to spread it out some. The film was
slower and the extra light required to get that extra stop
and cover for the softer throws helped bring out the studio
use of strobe lights. Someone brought out the umbrella,
and so on.
The point of all this is, much of the techniques of portrait
photography is to over come the short comings of our
equipment. Small reflector cups for lights were invented to
blast as much of the light as possible into an angle of view
typically used by the photographer. Quality be damned.
The flash equipment of today has enough power to modify it
enough to reproduce a more natural and pleasing light that
has been part of the human experience since man separated
from the chimps in the family tree. (Man was a twilight
creature, hidding at night, resting at mid day and foraging
at the early and later hours, soft light times) Electric
light has only been practical the last hundred years, gas
lights two hundred and mostly for the upper classes, most of
us have a great grandparent with stories of life before
electricity. The notion of sunbathing was very alien to
these ggp's. Man has spent eon's lurking in open shade,
sitting in a tree on the savana, kicking our feet at the
mouth of the cave, working all day is a concept new to the
industrial revolution. oops, where the heck am I going with
all this, I don't know, I forgot what the I was talking
about. Oh, a cavet, most of the historical stuff was bits
and pieces that I picked up here and there, some of it may
be true, some out of context and some I just made up cause
it sounded right but hey, this is the usenet, don't believe
everything you read.
Anyway, don't be a slave of tradition, of the camera store
salesman, don't replicate the experience of your highschool
picture session or the studio of the guy you assisted for
cause for the most part that's what they have been doing.
The manufacturers of the junk we use promote the stuff we
buy and we buy it cause that's what they sell and promote.
Besides, they would rather sell a $300 softbox than a
curtain that would actually be much better cause we'd take
one look at it and realize that we could make something just
as good for $50 worth of fabric remnents and drappery
hardware.
John G. Silver
zeitgeist wrote in message <38829E3D...@mindspring.com>...
> When photography was invented some hundred and fifty years
Very interesting and thank you for that, loved it.
JS
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Scott Watson
-- Scott Watson