Different types of Photographic lighting

Backlighting:

‘In lighting design, backlighting is the process of illuminating the subject from the back. In other words, the lighting instrument and the viewer face each other, with the subject in between. This creates a glowing effect on the edges of the subject, while other areas are darker. The backlight can be a natural or artificial source of light. When artificial, the back light is usually placed directly behind the subject in a 4-point lighting setup. A back light, which lights foreground elements from the rear, is not to be confused with a background light, which lights background elements (such as scenery).’

(no date) Available at: 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backlighting_(lighting_design) (Accessed: 7 December 2015).

Side lighting:

‘Side lighting is light that falls on a subject at roughly ninety degrees to the camera. This means that one side of a subject will be lit and the other side will be in shadow. In terms of helping to convey a subject’s shape and form this is ideal. Of the three directions, side lighting creates the strongest sense that a subject has three dimensions. There’s always a catch however. The catch in this instance is contrast. Side lighting doesn’t evenly illuminate your subject.

Frontal lighting:

‘Frontal lighting is lighting that emanates either from behind the camera or from the camera itself. Built-in or on-camera flash is a frontal light. Frontal lighting has one big advantage. It evenly illuminates your subject so metering is fairly straightforward. However, it tends to flatten a subject. The shadows cast by frontal light are behind the subject, out of sight from the camera’s point of view. Shadows help to give a sense of shape and form to a subject. Without shadows a subject’s shape becomes more ambiguous. Shadows can also add drama to a photo. Frontal light lacks drama, making a photo look more like a record shot and be less interesting for this reason.’

Understanding lighting: Front light, back light & side light (no date) Available at: 
http://www.my-photo-school.com/2013/11/13/understanding-lighting-direction/ (Accessed: 7 December 2015).

Natural lighting:

‘Natural light is considered by many photographers to be the best type of lighting. Because natural light encompasses the entire light spectrum, there is little to no colour distortion in the photograph. However, natural light is not constant; depending on the time of day, the position of the sun and cloud cover, the look of the light changes.

Artificial lighting:

‘Artificial light is more consistent than natural light; however, not all artificial light sources work with the entire light spectrum and can alter how the colours in the photograph look. Types of artificial lights include tungsten, florescent and flash. When using artificial light, photographers will take steps to counteract the unwanted colour distortion.’

Ehlert, S. (2015) Definition of lighting for photography. Available at: http://www.ehow.com/about_6551792_definition-lighting-photography.html (Accessed: 7 December 2015).

Rim lighting:

‘A rim light positioned behind the subject and facing toward the camera illuminates the edges of the subject from behind so they glow and are visually separated from the darker background. In portrait photography a rim light is often used to back light the hair’.

ShortCourses-The rim light (no date) Available at: 
http://www.shortcourses.com/use/using6-15.html (Accessed: 7 December 2015).

Ambient lighting:

‘Ambient light means the light that is already present in a scene, before any additional lighting is added. It usually refers to natural light, either outdoors or coming through windows etc. It can also mean artificial lights such as normal room lights. This sort of lighting can be the photographer's friend and/or enemy. Clearly ambient light is important in photography and video work, as most shots rely largely or wholly on ambient lighting.’

Ambient light (no date) Available at: 
http://www.mediacollege.com/lighting/ambient/ (Accessed: 7 December 2015).

Soft lighting:

‘Soft light falling on the subject from a source that's large compared to the subject, wraps light around the subject, filling shadows and lowering contrast. Outdoors you see this light on a cloudy bright day when the entire layer of clouds is the light source.

Hard lighting:

‘Hard light coming from a source that's small compared to the subject casts hard shadows and has high contrast. Outdoors you see this light on a bright sunny day. The sun may be very large but it's also far away and small in the sky so it casts hard light on subjects.’

ShortCourses-Understanding hard and soft light (no date) Available at: http://www.shortcourses.com/tabletop/lighting2-8.html (Accessed: 7 December 2015).

Spotlight:

This is when a focused amount of light highlights a particular section your subject/scene. Spotlights can create strong shadows and contrast. It can also add dramatic impacts to all genres of photography.

High/Low key lighting:

‘Both High Key images and Low Key images make an intensive use of contrast, but in a very different way. While High Key images are considered happy and will show your subject as a tooth-paste poster; Low Key portraits are dramatic and convey a lot of atmosphere and tension.

When looking at a High Key picture, you’ll notice two things right away; high exposure levels and lack of contrast. In Low Key images the tone is darker, and the controlling colour is usually black. There will be lots of dark areas in the picture. It is also very common for Low Key images to give special attention to contour lines, emphasizing them with highlights.’

Tirosh, U. (2007) ‘Reviews’, DIY, 4 October. Available at: 
http://www.diyphotography.net/lighting-high-key-and-low-key/ (Accessed: 7 December 2015).