Lighting plays a particularly crucial part in still life photography. It is one of the most effective ways to create mood or add interest

photography is painting with light, right? Lighting plays a particularly crucial part in still life photography. It is one of the most effective ways to create mood or add interest to your photos. The good thing about still life is that you don’t really have to rely on a super-expensive lighting setup. Sometimes simply setting up your arrangement in window light can work wonders! If you plan on shooting next to a window, you’ll often want to choose one that isn’t exposed to direct sunlight. Otherwise, the light will be too harsh. But then again, if your image calls for a harsh light source, that’s not to say you can’t use direct sunlight. You can create beautiful contrast and an edgy, graphic style by shooting still life images in direct sunlight.

Backlighting

One of my favourite types of light is backlighting. I love the rim light it creates and how it separates the subject from the background beautifully. To create backlighting, simply place your subject against a light source. I like to use sunlight and light my subject using a reflective source. Reflectors are one of the most affordable and easiest ways to experiment with light. A single reflector will let you start manipulating the natural light in your scene without any need for additional lighting equipment.

Whether you are trying to soften shadows, increase the illumination of your subject, or

Above: Backlighting has helped to separate the pink flowers from the rest of the image, while dark shadows were mitigated by avoiding harsh natural light.

Above left: You can avoid harsh natural light by shooting early or late in the day, or when it’s cloudy. The result is diffused light that’s both soft and flattering. highlight the textures in your composition, reflectors can help in a big way.

Timing is everything

Shooting a backlit photo in harsh light will lose a lot of detail due to overexposed areas and dark shadows. Try to avoid shooting around midday, as the sun will be at its most intense. It’s important to plan at what time of day you’re going to shoot. Early morning or late afternoon will produce softer and more even lighting. Late afternoon is an especially good time to shoot as it will be bright enough without being too harsh, which will help you create images with richer colours and depth. Overcast days are another good option as cloud cover diffuses sunlight. If you have to shoot on a sunny day and the light is too harsh, try using white fabric as a diffuser.

Find your direction

To create more drama using light, you can experiment with the direction of your lighting. Observe and place your subject in different positions to see how the light affects it. Side and backlighting tends to result in more interesting shots than directly lighting your subject. Creative lighting helps to create shapes, bring out textures and form interesting shadows to add mood. Also, this kind of lighting can create a bright focal point on one side of the image that helps lead the viewer’s eye through your composition.

MOVING PICTURES

Just because it’s called still life, it doesn’t have to be

still. You can add elements of motion to your compositions, which is a fun way to take your photos one step further. Capturing motion really gives the impression that time has frozen and adds the feeling that something’s happening. For instance, it’s impossible to see the wind, but we can create the feeling and atmosphere of a breeze by adding floating objects like flower petals, or the dancing flame on a candle. Similarly, dripping water droplets can depict rain. There are so many ways you can convey motion in your still life compositions. You have two options when creating motion, capturing it in-camera, or building composites using editing software.

Help from a friend

If you’re capturing movement in-camera, you’ll want to make use of your camera’s self-timer or a

Above: Movement can add additional interest and an extra dimension to the narrative of your still life. The flapping pages and falling petals in this image suggest a gentle breeze. remote shutter release. This will allow you to make the objects move while you simultaneously take the shot. But it can be hard to multitask and can often prove difficult to time precisely. This is why I would recommend working with an assistant (if possible) who can, for example, throw elements into the air while you use your Nikon’s continuous drive mode to shoot a burst sequence.

To crisply freeze elements in midair, you need to use a high shutter speed like 1/1600 sec or 1/2000 sec. Alternatively, you can create a motion-blur effect by using a slower shutter speed – this will give the image a real-life impression of movement. Try both techniques, depending on the mood and results you’re looking for.

Movement in post

If you opt for compositing the elements later on in Photoshop, try to shoot all the extra images at the same spot and in the same light. That way you don’t have to match the colours and lighting with your main image later, in post-processing. One fantastic advantage of compositing the elements digitally is it allows you to enhance the composition exactly as you want it, as in-camera you can’t really control the direction of the falling objects. You can also add motion blur digitally to recreate that slow-shutterspeed look to add more realism. Adding a few elements in the background and blurring them to match the photograph’s depth of field will create an even more realistic result. This is why I always shoot some extra out-of-focus shots of the moving elements I intend to use.