Hey everyone! Felix Lee here, and as a studio photographer, I’m always trying to break down the basics in a way that’s easy to understand. I recently revisited Mark Wallace’s fantastic episode of Exploring Photography on the three-light setup, and it got me thinking about how essential this foundation is for anyone getting into studio portraiture.
Why do we even bother with a three-light setup? Well, it’s not just about following a rigid formula. It’s about learning the fundamentals. It’s about understanding what a key light is, what a fill light does, what a reflector brings to the table, and what a separation light is for. It’s about metering, light ratios… the whole shebang!
Now, Mark’s right about one thing. Let’s be honest, he shows a very basic three-light setup with a key, a fill, and a hair light, and admits it’s probably a lighting setup you’ll never actually use. But that’s not the point! We do it so we can learn the principles of lighting. That’s gold.
Then, like Mark says, the real magic happens when you mix things up and show how the three-light setup can be applied to almost any lighting scenario out there. That’s how we grow. That’s what inspires people to experiment.
And speaking of inspiring people, to help me illustrate this, I’ve got a fantastic model in the studio today. You might even recognize her from some of my earlier work… it’s Tossie!
Our Journey Starts With the Key Light
So, like Mark says, our three-light setup begins with our very first light. That’s our key light. Now, everything we’re going to talk about is relative to the position of our camera and our light. In my head, I always have to think about: What is the camera seeing and how is the light affecting it?
When I’m talking about my camera, remember I’m talking about the imaginary camera that’s going to be right here. So the first light that we’re going to be working on, this is our key light. Some people call it the main light. It is the light that defines the basic look of our lighting setup. This is one of our most important things.
As Mark points out, we’re going to meter this light, and then we’re going to meter all the other lights in relationship to this light. That’s why we call this the key, the main light, because it’s the thing that defines the entire setup.
So, what we’re going to be doing here (as Mark would say), is we have this nice giant softbox. You can see, very, very big! It’s there to give us soft light. In my opinion, if you’re new to studio lighting, I highly suggest that you use a big old softbox or a large umbrella. It’s going to be very forgiving. Like Mark says, you’re going to get great results!
But the first thing we need to do (again, echoing Mark), is we need to figure out where to put this light, and we need to figure out our proper exposure. So first, let’s talk about where we put the key light.
Mark’s approach is spot on. For this, I want to have some nice contrast. So, I want Tossie to have light on one side of her face, and I want that to fall into shadow on the other side of her face. I don’t want to put this all the way over to the side because that contrast would be so high that it would just be dark, totally dark on this side, and way too bright on this side. So what we need to do is we need to sort of split. It’s about balance and subtlety.
My Personal Touch:
Here’s where I start to diverge a little from the basic setup. While Mark focuses on the fundamentals (and that’s super important!), I also like to think about the story I’m trying to tell with the light. Is it a moody, dramatic portrait? Or something more lighthearted and airy?
I spent some time as an engineer, on a boat off the coast of Angola working 12h/day 7d/week before this, the light of the screen was all I could get. You can barely imagine what that was! Until I stumbled upon a book called the 4 Hour Work Week by Tim Ferriss, I am awaken, lol.
It’s not that I wasn’t happy, it’s the way I worked wasn’t exactly what I am good at. So I quitted and started learn photography, and then the light, the color, the moment, those skills, the light began its story telling, it really touches me. So here I am. This is something, you know, and all the gears started spinning together.
