Preliminary Exercise: Lighting

What is lighting in film? Lighting in film is made up of quality, direction, color and source. These different elements blend to catch our attention, create atmosphere and visual impact.

Why is lighting significant? There would be no film without lighting. Lighting is important to cinematic storytelling. Filmmakers have experimented lighting techniques for as long as it existed.

1. Ambient Lighting: Light on set that wasn't set up by the crew. 

- Can be artificial
or natural

- Headlights from cars

- Interior lights from set like lamps

2. Motivated Lighting: Lighting that was intentionally placed in a way to appear in a shot.

- Creates cinematic lighting styles with higher depth and contrast.

3. Practical Lighting: Light source appearing in the frame of a shot.

- doesn’t have to be ambient

- could be placed in the shot by a gaffer.

4. Natural Light: light that occurs naturally. 

- illumination coming from the sun or fire.

5. Artificial light: man-made lighting. 

- Streetlights, flashlights, LED panels.

Lighting is one of the more important technical aspects when it comes to creating your film. Knowing how to manipulate light in film can be used to your advantage when it comes to setting moods and supporting the emotions of characters. I think being able to mess with some level of lighting in my film will make it nicer to watch.