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Lighting Study: The Owl

 

Lighting Study: The Owl

The weather is cold and blustery and there isn’t any snow, conditions that are less than ideal for nature and landscape photography. Instead, I spent a few hours indoors working on technique, specifically low key lighting. My subject is a metal bookend that was made in India. It’s about 4-5” tall and a dark brownish color.

The placement of the light in this study is referred to as Rembrandt lighting: a main light off to one side, coupled with a reflector opposite it. It accentuates the details and partially obscures the unlit half of the object, which gets all its illumination from bouncing off of the reflector (in this case a small white card). I think the result is quite dramatic, giving that owl a bit of drama, maybe even a sinister look.

The forecast calls for warmer weather in the next few days before a bout of rain later in the week. With luck, I’ll get out in the field and bring back some photos to share on this blog.

Please leave your comments and questions in the comments section. Thank you.