LIGHTING AND DEPTHWilliam King | Luke Kirkwood | Shelly Kilford

Light plays a major role in all aspects of everyday life.

Our vision is formed around how our brains

read the light that enters our eyes.

This light comes from both natural and artificial sources

Natural sources include

The Sun

The Moon

Bryce 3D Rendering

Fire

Lightning

Artificial Lighting

Lighting plays a major role in any illustration

Factors to consider include:

What is the light source?

Where is the light source?

How many light sources?

How is the light going to behave?

If the sun is the light source then the illustrator must decide on factors such as:

Time of day

Sunlight behaves in different ways throughout the day. As the

earth rotates, the suns position changes altering the amount of

atmosphere that the light must travel through.

At midday, the light is travelling through a thinner layer of

atmosphere and creates the blue sky effect.

At dusk and dawn the light travels through a thicker layer and this

can create a red/pink effect.

Sun at midday

Dusk and Dawn

Where is the light source?

The location of the light source plays a key role in an illustration.

It will dictate which areas are lit, which areas are cast in

shadow and how the light behaves.

The direction of the light has a massive influence on the effect of an image or illustration.

Light will generally either be cast from

The front

Behind

The sides

From above

If they are utilised appropriately they can bring the desired mood, atmosphere and emotion to an illustration

Light will have different behavioural attributes and characteristics depending on its environment.

For example, when light hits an object, it bounces off, this is called reflecting. The reflection will depend upon the material and colour of the object. Some objects suchas glass and water are very reflective.

Some objects will absorb some of the light when it hits it. So when the light leaves the object it is carrying some of the objects colour which will give the surrounding area a glowing effect of that colour.

This is called radiance

Some materials will allow light to pass through them. This is called refraction. Examples of this include water, glass and clouds.

As the light passes through it is scattered amongst the material and in some cases this brings out all the colours of the spectrum and creates a rainbow effect.

These are all factors that must be taken into consideration when constructing an illustration if you intend to create any realism.

With careful selection of lighting effects an illustrator can control how the reader interprets an illustration and the message that is being put across.

High Key Lighting

A simple definition of High Key Lighting is when the background is lighter than the subject.

High-key lighting is usually quite homogeneous and free from dark shadows.

Low Key Lighting

Low key light accentuates the contours of an object by throwing areas into shade while a fill light or reflector may illuminate the shadow areas to control contrast.

In artistic terms this is known as a chiaroscuro effect.

Chiaroscuro which is Italian for clear-dark is a term in art for a contrast between light and dark. The term is usually applied to bold contrasts affecting a whole composition, but is also more technically used by artists and art historians for the use of effects representing contrasts of light, not necessarily strong, to achieve a sense of volume in modelling three-dimensional objects such as the human body.

Giovanni Baglione. Sacred Love Versus Profane Love. 1602-1603 Oil on canvas. 179 x 118 cm. Gemäldegalerie, Staatliche Museen, Berlin

Joseph Wright of Derby painted several large groups with strong chiaroscuro, like The Orrery

Wide Band: DOF.All aspect of the picture are in focus from the couple in the front to the houses in the back

Foreground and Narrowband Depth of Field

Orians Nebula; Ultimate Depth of Field 1,150,000 light years away