Focus On Lighting Photos Focus on the Fundamentals.pdf

Other light sources are available
to us besides the sun. What are
they and what color is their light?
Tungsten lights produce yellow/
orange light. These can be
tungsten house lamps or quartzhalogen
lights. (Quartz-halogen
refers to the type of glass and
the gas inside; the filament is still
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<strong>Focus</strong> <strong>On</strong> <strong>Lighting</strong> <strong>Photos</strong>
tungsten.) Candles sort of fit into
this category, but their light is redder.
If we leave our camera set
to daylight but our light source is
actually yellow, we get a yellow/
orange image. If we want colors
as we see them (that is, neutralcolored
with our brain adjusting
for the yellow), then we set the
camera to tungsten; the camera
will compensate for the yellow
and we will get a neutral image
with no yellow cast. (Under U.S.
law, classic, energy-inefficient
tungsten lights will become illegal
to sell in 2014, but we predict
they will be replaced by other
lights of the same color.)
The only light source here is
a household lamp with a big
white shade. The telephone
is just below it. With the
camera set to tungsten, we
get a pretty neutral image.
The only change we made
here was to set the camera
to its daylight setting. The
image is very warm. Both
approaches can lead to good
pictures. We just have to
decide what we want.