Digital Photo Tip #8 By Bruce Kirkby Oct 1, 2005

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See the Light

Three critical elements contribute to making a photograph truly eye-catching. Two—the subject and composition—are obvious. Many beginning photographers focus all their attention and effort here, forgetting the third, crucial component: light.

The quality of light striking your subject is what will make or break your image, be it a landscape or close-up. The most compelling scene, taken from the most unusual angle, will still look terrible if it is washed out by a bright midday sun.

It is the early hours of dawn and the fading twilight of evening that offer the best photographic opportunities, when stark shadows recede, and a gentle luminescence lights the land.

In the hour before sunset (and after sunrise), the spectrum of available light shifts towards red. Until the effect is very pronounced (just as the sun nears the horizon), your brain compensates, making what you see appear to be bathed in white light. But take a photograph during the hour leading up to sunset (or after sunrise), and you may be pleasantly surprised, finding the result richer than you expected.

While hiking in the foothills west of Edmonton, we spotted a bear. Rather than training my lens on the distant speck, I took a snap of my girlfriend, Christine. (Photographs of distracted or relaxed subjects always work best.) Although there was no red yet in the sky, it is the warm light of the midsummer evening that makes the image striking.