srt101fan

Content is king!

Unless light IS the subject (and it can be), it serves mainly in support of the content...

JohnSwanda Loc: San Francisco

There's content, composition, timing, all important in photography. How can lighting be "everything"?

GoofyNewfie Loc: Kansas City

It’s not everything, but it’s a key ingredient.
It’s usually the difference between taking a picture and making one.

PixelStan77 Loc: Vermont/Chicago

Light is our language in creating an image. I went back 8 times to a location till the light was right for me.Composition is next. Welcome to the forum.

scubadoc Loc: Sarasota, FL

Probably a good time to quote Henri Cartier-Bresson and his take on the “decisive moment” or what makes a memorable photographic image:

The decisive moment is a concept that refers to capturing an event that is ephemeral and spontaneous, where the image represents the essence of the event itself. Composition, lighting, and subject interest are all intertwined.

JohnSwanda Loc: San Francisco

I have seen great photographs taken under lousy lighting conditions, say midday sunlight. The subject, composition, and timing were enough. Great lighting can make a great photo, but even that isn't essential to make a great photo.

srt101fan

CHG_CANON Loc: the Windy City

Is there something more to photography than megapixels?

Linda From Maine Loc: Yakima, Washington

If you read past the title, the OP said "right now I'm..." and "I was wondering if any of the pros had that stop upon their journeys?" (emphasis mine)

Is it possible to focus this discussion on our experiences with, and advice regarding, light? 🤔

EDIT - OK, apparently Paul doesn't think so. I'm not quite as jaded regarding the potential of this forum...yet.

flyboy61 Loc: The Great American Desert

Probably every last one of them.

via the lens Loc: Northern California, near Yosemite NP

Watch a Joe McNally workshop to get a new twist on lighting if you do not believe that good lighting is a key element in photography. He is a master of light.

E.L.. Shapiro Loc: Ottawa, Ontario Canada

Yes! The etymology or the term "Photography" is painting, drawing, imaging (take your pick) with light so LIGHTING is important on many levels- scientific, technical, artistic and aesthetic.

I don't,however,believe that there is only ONE most important aspect or component of successful photography. A photograph can be properly exposed, elegantly lighted, but if the composition is not effective and the subject matter is not interesting and/or the timing is off and the so-called decisive moment was not captured- it's still a BUST! A good photograph is a well-balanced combination (mixture, amalgamation, cocktail, compound, or synthesis) again, take your pick of synonyms, but the fact is if you remove any of the components, the image falls apart!

This is not to understate the importance of LIGHTING. The photographer's use of light has a significant influence on all the other aspects of photography and overlaps into areas of exposure and contrast, both panchromatic and color rendition, certain aspects of composition, the creation of dimensionality, mood and more.

Although many folks on this forum laud the importance of lighting, it, as a subject of such consequence seems to be the forgotten stepchild in an overwhelming plethora of gear, computer technology, everyone's reaching for the pinnacle of lens performance (etc.) and not really caring about the quality and aesthetics of the light that is passing through all those super-sharp lenses.

I'll prove my case! So many folks are buying and using Speedlights for their flash application- a type of unit without a modeling light where the can't even SEE their lighting effect and the complain about the "bad" lighting of flash. There are so many posts about flash-triggers, radio slaves, off-camera lighting but hardly anyone talks about where the heck and how to place all those remote-controlled lights! The came is said to have a "command" function but the PHOTOGRAPHER is supposed to be the commander!. I can submit here a list of many subjects, important areas of photographic lighting, that are never or hardly discussed in this forum to any great extent regardless of how they influence every aspect of photography- in the studio, on location, all kinds of artificial and natural light usage and every kind of work in photography! Here's the list: Angle of incidents, unseen secondary light, the inverse square law, the Chiaroscuro effect, penumbra, umbra, and antumbra, feathering, subtractive and additive lighting, from-fill, unified and dis-unified lighting forms, theses and all the finite lighting forms in portraiture and still-life work. All of these phenomena are NOT confined to studio work or set up artificial lighting- the theory and practice are pertinent to all kinds of lighting situations.

If you work in a studio-like environment, YOU have to provide effective lighting. If you are work in natural, available, or existing light, YOU have to find, recognize and utilize the right lighting or know how to work around less than ideal lighting. All of this requires that you learn to SEE the light, not only in quantity but in direction, quality (hard, soft, diffused, concentrated, spread out, etc) and exactly HOW it strikes the subject whether it is a single person, a bird, an animal, a mountain range, architectural subjects or whatever you choose to photograhy opr specialize in.

Then there is the SCIENCE: Color temperature, wavelengths, spectral properties, discontinuous spectrum, filtration, white-balance, and exposure considerations.

There is hardly any if any at all, literature about the dynamics of lighting in photography. There are many books, online tutorials with all kinds of gear suggestions and diagrams but hardly anything with the rudiments. If you know the basics, YOU will be the best judge of what lighting gear is best for your kind of work, how to troubleshoot all kinds of lighting issues, and how to best utilize and modify existing light in many kinds of situations. Even the most sophisticated camera can measure light, determine a white balance, set exposure and avail you of various compensations and the menu settings can allow you to fiddle with various renditions, saturation and contrasts, but there is no built-in program for the aesthetics- those are function of you eyes and you mind and some of it requires talent and much requires learning!

Delta2 Loc: Boise, Idaho

Thank you all for your thoughtful replies. I am so impressed by the responses I've seen since I've been following UHH. My son surprised me last November for my birthday: a Sony a6400 with a 18-50 kit lens.
He wanted to upgrade, which he did, and I received the best camera I've ever had, the first camera that could actually change lenses AND work in low light (I've since purchased a Sony 35mm 1.8 and 50mm 1.8 for this camera = much better in low light--got that from UHH, you know). How new to photography am I? I just purchased my first tripod, which will be here tomorrow.

The thought of first experimenting with different lighting on one subject first came to me back in 1982 when my wife and I made a point of being at the Grand Canyon on the longest day of the year: to be there at sunrise and sunset...just because. But that is when I noticed the phenomenal transformation my perception of the canyon went through as the light shifted, and the cumulus clouds partially dampened the sunlight, then bright again.

Back then I had a film camera--and no, not an SLR. It was a point and pray. Didn't keep any photos from it, but the vivid memory remains.

So that's what I'm playing with now: light and shadows, sharpened and diffused (using ideas from UHH about different materials to place between light source and subject). Fascinating...to me. Lastly, here in Boise, ID, this time of year offers much more opportunity to shoot in the various shades of gray--clouds and fog, rain and snow, all of which change my perception of the tree out front on a minute to minute basis.

Camera's on, set to A, lens cap off--what a way to spend a day.

Linda From Maine Loc: Yakima, Washington

How wonderful to hear! Looking forward to seeing perhaps a series of "many shades of my tree" ? All the best to you!

flyboy61 Loc: The Great American Desert

And...is still continuing, I bet! I think we tend to make photography harder than it really is, with "in depth" discussions. Fer ninstance...Bokeh. How do you pronounce that anyhow? What a lot of discussion over what was once called "out of focus background"! Since I had to memorize arcane terms like "diffraction", and "circle of confusion" back in the '50s for Military photo qualification tests, I never remember anyone in the real world saying "Diffraction caused my photo to fall all to pieces!" Or..."MY lens' Circle of Confusion is smaller than yours!" But..now that it's been mentioned, would you like to bet...

One old-timey photog was fond of saying(paraphrased)"The essential mechanics of photography can be taught well in about an hour...The EYE...it is the eye that takes a lifetime to acquire." For some like me, the mechanics will take a bit longer, and a few acquire the "eye" sooner rather than later, and some never do, but the struggle makes them more accomplished than at first.

After yesterday's game, the mantra "Go back to basics, and EXECUTE" can be applied to photography, too. Or...maybe...KISS!