David Allen Smith wrote:

say what?!?


are you suggesting that if your incident meter reads f 8.0 you can shoot f 45 with film or  f 22 with digital and you'll still get an "acceptable image"?

that's what it sounds like you said...

digital shoots like transparency... your exposure needs to be dead on, much more than a 1/3 stop off and its going bad.

you can push/pull neg film a couple of stops at the most.

5 stops! good lord man...


Hair Light = Sometimes

I like to call it the "kick light"... picked that up from an old school guy I worked with.


anyway there is no "right way" to do lighting... but there are plenty or wrong ways.


There are endless styles of lighting, the main thing is that you look at the light, see how it falls on the subject, and sculpt it to your liking.

Interesting and well put.  I don't mean to get off topic here ... wait, yes I do.  But if film has more latitude than digital ...  Then what's with all the comments about digital photographers becoming "pros" overnight?  And, hey, us "old school" guys know what we're talking about cause we shot with film.  I feel digital is more complicated than film (I've shot both).

Anyhow, I also believe in a kick light.  I guess what scares people is the term "hair light".  Cause it makes us all think of that shot where the "big haired blonde" with extremely dark red lipstick and an outfit to match Modonna in the 80's.  Eww, that just gives me the creaps.  I actually think I had a nightmare about that once.

Maybe instead of writing about why people don't use what I use anymore topics ...  We could have a forum about how we all use our kick light or "hair light".  There are plenty of cool techniques that I'm sure all of us can share without getting on the defensive.  KO

David Allen Smith wrote:
I think the main difference between film capture and digital is the instant feedback

with film you you don't get the feedback until its processed, at which point its too late to fix anything you screwed up while shooting.  You just have to get it right. The best you could do was shoot polaroids for feedback, and then only in medium and large format.

Digital you can take a shot, look at it, decide if you like the way its looking, see if your exposure is on, etc...

Digicams almost make light meters obsolete, if you know how to read a histogram well.

Before digital I wouldn't dare shoot anything without my sekonic in hand. (I still use it but wouldn't feel completely naked without)





the only time I feel I "have" to use a kicker is if the subject and background are close to the same tones and I don't want to lose the edges.

I personally like directional light and heavy shadows and sometimes I don't WANT to see detail throughout...

rules be damned!


De Gustibus Non Disputandum Est

Nice response.  I agree.