/// LIGHT PAINTING Photography (!!!) and It's application in visual (VIDEO) media ///

Have You heard about Light Painting Photography!?

It's a photography technique which uses long exposures to create magical images in dark spaces. It uses light source of any kind to be the brush for one's personal digital painting; something like this:

I'll tell You a brief History of Light Painting / Light Drawing

Light painting, more specifically light drawing, dates back to 1889 when Étienne-Jules Marey and Georges Demeny created the first known light painting “Pathological Walk From in Front”.

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In 1949 Pablo Picasso was visited by Gjon Mili, a photographer and lighting innovator, who introduced Picasso to his photographs of ice skaters with lights attached to their skates. Immediately Picasso started making images in the air with a small flashlight in a dark room. This series of photos became known as Picasso's "light drawings."

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During the 1970s and 80's Eric Staller used this technology for numerous photo projects that were called "Light Drawings".

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EQUIPMENT ~ light painting kit

ESSENTIAL

• Light source – sparklers, glow sticks, torches, mobile phones,LED lights... (anything that glows in the dark)

• Digital camera – a DSLR camera where you can adjust the shutter speed

GOOD TO HAVE

• Coloured filters – filters made out of colored papers that can be put onto white LED light source to change the colour of light.

• A tripod – the long exposure means the camera must stay still so that the images don't get blurrydon’t get blurry. Camera can be placed on a stable surface like a table but a tripod is much easier to move around.

• Shutter release remote control – to eliminate camera shake and ‘click’ when you are away from the camera. Self-timer is also good way to control the starting time of exposure.

• At least one friend to tag along (!!!) - I'm serious, it's impossible to be the photographer, model and the persong making the painting, two friends are optimal

Here my camera was on a tripod and I adjusted selftimer on 12 seconds. I was painting with sparkles while my friend Marko posed.

Setup and shooting

There are certain conditions that must be satisfied when creating light painting photography.

It needs to be dark in the room or on the place where the photography is taken.

Digital camera is placed on a tripod or a stable surface.

The camera is turned on and the settings are adjusted to specific needs of certain photography.

ISO value is always __set to the lowes__t (100 or 200) depending on a camera.

Manual mode or BULB should be used for exposure. That way the camera is not trying to guess the correct exposure. For exposures longer than 30 seconds (30″ on a camera) the BULB mode should be used because the most digital camera's exposures on a manual mode has 30 seconds for their maximum. Also, when the exposure time needs to be precise in a second (usually when the's no possibility to turn off the light source eg. when using sparkles) BULB mode is suitable.

After the setup is done, the camera on the tripod is placed on the spot where it gets the best frame of photography.

It is best to make concept for the photography earlier.

The light/lights are turned on and the shooting begins. This is the most interesting and artistic part of this digital photography technique because there is always a moment of surprise. Every photography an author will take is personal and exciting.

An image showing the setup and sooting.

EXPERIMENTAL PART

I have created a conceptual video out my light painting photos which are following this concept named ''Power of Light''.

As shown there is one main circle with a jin-jang symbol.

In Chinese philosophy, jin and jang describes how apparently opposite or contrary forces are actually complementary, interconnected, and interdependent in the natural world, and how they give rise to each other as they interrelate to one another.

Many tangible dualities (such as light and dark, day and night, male and female, expanding and contracting) are thought of as physical manifestations of the duality symbolized by yin and yang.

In shown chart the meaning is chosen to represent male and female vibrant energy.

It is coloured in the spectrum of light choosing a meaning of bright, positive energy.

Jin-Jang symbol is connected to four rings.

1st Ring represents RGB (Red,Green and Blue) colour model with extended colour spectrum of red colour (through orange to yellow). It also contains Black and White (B/W) gradient which consists out of monochrome colours.

2nd Ring represent four clasical elements: earth, water, fire and air.

3rd Ring presents 4 seasons: spring, summer, autumn and winter.

4rth Ring presents visible colour spectrum and it is connected to all other elements of the conceptual framework.

There are also four conceptual links visible in the chart and they connect specific colour, element and season.

1st conceptual link connects green colour to an earth element and spring season.

2nd conceptual link ties blue colour to a water element and summer season.

3rd conceptual link joins red colour to a fire element and autumn season.

4rth conceptual link combines white and gray colours with air and winter opposed to black that is always the background color.

THE FINAL VIDEO PRESENTATION OF MY WORK YOU CAN SEE HERE:

Enjoy!

For any aditional questions feel free to ask me in a comment!

Petra