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Lighting for Digital Media focuses on common lighting challenges for image makers.  After looking at short films from students and other 'Prosumer' videos I decided that a class in basic tools of capture and lighting should be offered.  This class is my answer to those who need a basic lighting class to help them achieve better quality imagery for both still imagery and for video shot with their still camera.  Most new digital cameras can capture both still imagery and also video.  Each assignment will focus problem solving for a lighting challenge.


Seven assignments will given during a ten week course.  Each assignment will have components.  One component is a single still image.  The second is a 30 sec video using the same lighting principles and techniques.  Ideally I would like all of the videos to have a small piece of dialog to accompany them.  I am researching dialog to give you to use for each assignment.  Do not worry about editing software for the videos.  If you have it or already use it (like iMovie or other software) great.  If you do not, it is not a concern.  Just shoot only 30 sec of footage and stop.  I am only interested in seeing raw footage for the assignments.  Here is a summary of the assignments:


Assignment 1, Portrait at sunset.  The basic challenge of shooting at sunset is getting the exposure of the sky and exposure for the subject to be close enough that you will not a white sky in your image or that you don't have silhouette of the person.  We will discuss metering for this situation and tools to control the lighting for the subject.  For the video portion of this assignment I would like you to have your subject say a small bit of dialog so that the video is not just a live version of the still picture.


The dialog I would like you to use is from Luigi Pirandello's 1921 Six Characters in Search of an Author.  Translated by Felicity Firth.  It seemed appropriate for the dislocated short films I am asking you to shoot.


"Yes, well! Thanks very much! But haven't you realised  yet that you're not going to be able to do this play?  You haven't got us inside you!  Your actors can only look at us from the outside! How can you expect anybody to live their life in front of a kind distorting mirror, which doesn't just freeze expression in a reflected image, but twists it into a total travesty which we don't even recognise?" 

Assignment 2, Portrait in the shade during a very sunny day.  Picking up from the first assignment you will photography someone in the shade, perhaps in dappled light, perhaps not, during a very bright sunny day.  One of the challenges is color temperature for the shade verses the sun, and other of course is exposure.

Assignment 3, Capturing a person in a moving car or other motion (like running or skateboarding).

Assignment 4, Portrait of subject in available light plus secondary lighting.

Assignment 5, Lighting for interiors with only secondary lighting.

Assignment 6,  Lighting in the studio to replicate daylight setting.

Assignment 7,  Combining imagery from location and studio.

Your 3 assignments are based on traditional photography themes.  The first is a documentary, the second is a portrait, and the last is a landscape. 

The documentary assignment has two lessons to be learned.  The first is how to create a unified group of images.  The second is how to manage the files you will be photographing.

Portrait assignment focuses on two technical challenges as well as capturing something interesting about your subject.   You will be required to photograph a person or persons in an environment.  Detail must be present in all highlight and blacks without sacrificing contrast.  You will learn how to achieve this through capturing your subject with a raw file and then developing it through the Raw Dialog Box of Adobe Photoshop.  The other technical challenge will be to use the same tools in the Raw Dialog Box that allowed to have detail and contrast to create a treated image that will tweak color, contrast, and values.

The final Landscape assignment will concentrate on compositing 12 images into one large panoramic.  This will center on both the set up of the shot plus stitching together all of the frames in Adobe Photoshop by utilizing masking, the transform tool, clone tool, healing brush tool, and adjustment layers.

I will ask for weekly assignments to help motivate you, teach a specific technique, and reinforce lessons in class.  These assignments will require 10 images or less and will be projected in class for discussion.

The first three weekly assignments are "getting to know your camera" projects.  Weekly Assignment 1 has one limitation.  You must shoot with the largest aperture your camera lens can set to.  There is no limitation to subject matter.  Weekly Assignment 2 requires you to photograph using the smallest aperture your lens can be set to.  Your subject matter is your prerogative.  Weekly Assignment 3 requires you to 'Stop Time' and photograph at 1/500th or above to stop action.  

Below you will find detailed description of each assignment.

You have one week to complete this assignment.  The subject matter is open to your interpretation.  You will turn 10 images as jpgs for review in class.  Please bring your completed series of images to class on a portable storage for upload to the school transfer volume.  Your images will be projected using bridge and quick discussion will be held by the whole class.

For assignment one you must photograph only using the widest aperture your lens can be adjusted to.  This may be a wide as F 1.2 or F 4.  It will depend on your lens.  There is no right or wrong answer to the aperture setting, the right way to do this assignment is to shoot only with the widest aperture.

Edit your images from the week into your 20 best and bring them in for review on the second class meeting.

You have one week to complete this assignment.  Similar to Assignment 1, you will be editing your photos down to 20 for presentation.  For this project you will be limited to photographing at the smallest F-Stop your lens can go.  For some that might mean F-16 for others it could be as small as F-32.   To get a correct exposure you will have to adjust shutter speed and ISO.  This is especially true in low light situations.  Your subject matter is open, photograph whatever  you desire.

You have one week to complete this assignment.  Your project is to photograph at the fastest shutter speed your camera can set to.   I would like you "Stop Time" and capture freeze the motion of whatever subject you choose.  To achieve this you will need to make adjustments to both your ISO and Aperture.  Bring in 10 images for review the following week.

You have one week to complete the assignment.  This assignment is start of Project Two, environmental Portrait.  You need to photograph this assignment using RAW files.  Photograph a person or your self in three different lighting situations.  For example, in direct sunlight, inside a home, and inside a store or parking lot.  I want a variety of places so we can talk about color balance, exposure, and contrast using the RAW dialog box.  Bring them in to use as practice while we go over the RAW dialog box and development of RAW images in Photoshop.

You have one week to complete this assignment.  This is a HDR assignment.  I would like you to photograph an image that has a large range of values, one that would be hard to capture in exposure.  For instance, a room in a home while the sun is shining into the windows.  A image like that would have over a 5 stop range of values.  


Using  tripod photograph such a scene keeping the f-stop consistent and adjusting for the exposure using just your shutter speed and or ISO.  Take at least 5 images.  Bring those images in and we will go over the HDR settings in Photoshop together as a class.