lighting Work Lights

[Murdock]

So I just bought a couple of the work lights from Home Depot and I would like to recommend that noone buy these lights. The light is totally uneven. You get two "hot" lines parallel to the ground. The only thing I could see using these lights for is bouncing them off the ceiling to up the ambient light level in a room.

So, a lesson I already know, but didn't heed: You get what you pat for. And I paid for some work lights, not lighting lights.

 

[directorik]

a wall of light type thing with the subject in profile.

You mean silhouette, right?

Try two lights to the right and left of camera. Use blackwrap to
focus the light on the wall and away from the subject. Then
expose to the wall. Anyone standing in front of the wall should
be underexposed and in silhouette.

Use a dimmer to adjust the light and the iris to control what is
properly exposed.

 

[Murdock]

Yea that's what I meant. I'll give this a go this weekend.

 

[Ernest Worthing]

Your silhouette work is fine.

But if i remember correctly, you wanted a pure white background while having ur subject well exposed. If that's the case, i would suggest trying the following:

Expose in ur camera for ur subject, lighting him/her in whichever manner you want. Behind the subject, have a white background. Light the background two stops or so higher than ur subject. If you expose for the subject, the background should blow out to a pure white. And leave some space between the subject and the background.