Chapter 2: Light, Shadow, and Color Sharpen your awareness Photographers are observers. Their ability to analyze light conditions is one profound difference that sets them apart from snap shooters. By definition, a snapshot is a hurried shot fired with little aim or preparation. Snap shooters go willy-nilly into every photo situation without taking time to consider the all-important interplay of light and subject. They point the camera in the general direction of a subject, click off a shot, and move on. Unfortunately, their lack of attention to detail shows in the results. Their pictures usually feature confusing composition and harsh or indifferent light. It’s pure luck if one of their snapshots happens to turn out well. Of course, everyone can use a little bit of luck, but it’s best not to rely on it for success. As the saying goes, “Luck favors the well-prepared.” That preparation includes sharpening your awareness of light and how it interacts with the subject. Being acutely sentient of your surroundings at all times is part of the photographer’s job description.
Because not much can be done to control the light outdoors, photographers strive to always put themselves in situations favorable to good lighting conditions. Usually, that means being on location during sunrise and sunset hours to take advantage of the low, warm tones of first and last light. It can be the most rewarding time of day. Photographers call it “prime” or “sweet” light, when the sun is only a few degrees above the horizon. At these times of the day, sunlight carries with it a lot of extra color that enhances everything it touches. During morning’s first minutes after sunrise and evening’s last minutes before sunset, the sun’s light passes through more of the earth’s atmosphere than at any other time of day. The combination of airborne dust, pollution, and moisture acts like a giant diffuser to soften the sun’s light, filtering it toward the red or warm end of the spectrum. Because daytime activities and winds stir up a lot of extra particulates in the atmosphere, and they tend to settle during the calm of nighttime, sunset hues are usually warmer and more diffuse than the purer light at sunrise.
Long shadows and reddish light make sunrise and sunset the best times to photograph dramatic landscape subjects, such as the Grand Canyon. Light, Shadow, and Color
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