The following is a direct copy and has been Pasted in for future reference from the Art of Photography coursework PDF Doc. (pasted in Maroon)
1 photograph
Sometimes, you may want the light to fall on just a part of the scene, having the surrounds in shadow. Most proprietary tungsten lamps and mains flash units are sold with a simple dish reflector, which concentrates the beam of light.
For a strong spotlight effect, concentrated lights with snoots or lenses need to be positioned at some distance from the subject.
The easiest way to confine the lighting is to place something dark, like a piece of black card, between the lamp and part of the subject. Experiment with this simple technique for yourself with any indoor shot that you set up.
If you are using a flash unit, try this: take enough thick black paper to be able to roll it into a tube of the same diameter as the lamp and about two feet long. Tape or staple it into this shape, and then tape it to the flash. The result will be a kind of spotlight. (But don’t try this with a tungsten lamp, because of the heat). If you have a slide projector, you can use this to concentrate light by inserting a piece of card the same size as a slide mount, cut with a circular hole, into the slide carrier.
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Equipment
Nikon D4
24/70 – f2.8 lens
Nikon S910 Speedlight
Light boom / stand
Speedlight Snoot
Method & Approach
With regards to this exercise I did not follow the above instructions of how to make a temporary snoot, as I already have a snoot which I regularly use with an external off camera flash unit. I did however setup a light boom with an of camera flash unit and snoot to capture the image below.
Please see picture and caption below.
Note – The picture has been compressed hence there might be a quality reduction when enlarging.
Picture 1
Camera Details
Camera Nikon D4
Speed 1/90th sec
Aperture f16
ISO 800
White Balance Setting Temperature 6150°K
Lens 14/24 mm
Focal Length 24 mm
Comments – A picture of my study area or the area named by my wife as “the Den.” Here we can see the concentrated snoot/light effect around the keyboard … and once again George Harrison has captured some of the spot light.
What have I learnt from this exercise
I have learnt from this exercise that using a snoot on a light source can be an effective way to pick out or separate an object from its surroundings, effectively bringing a greater emphasis upon the subject within the picture.
Thoughts and Reflection
It certainly takes more time to setup this effect and it might also take several attempts to get the light direction just right and at the point of achieving this, even more emphasis can be applied by narrowing the depth of field.
stingray493 