Light Cue 23

Last week I talked about Backlight and its many uses. Continuing my primer on basic lighting ideas I will now discuss the use of sidelighting.

For a long time sidelight was considered a specialty item or something only really used in the realm of dance. Even today I have seen numerous lighting designers who shy away from the use of sidelight in a play. This is unfortunate since sidelighting lends a wonderful depth and fullness to a design and is an invaluable tool at the lighting designer’s disposal.

When I discussed the various angles of light available to a designer I described sidelighting as something that “defines the physical form itself.” The use of sidelight allows us to see the “[b]ody as [a] sculptural object.” If backlight helps us to separate foreground from background, subject from object, then sidelighting allows us to see the thing itself, as itself.

Once defined independent of its context, the human form must now be revealed for what it is, a body in space. This is a body that moves from point A to point B. It is a body that wears clothes and those clothes move. Not only does sidelighting give us a clear idea of the human body, it also allows us to appreciate the clothing on that body as a formal object.

Dance is perhaps the medium to make the greatest use of sidelighting. Since the body of the dancer is the primary focus in dance, lighting is often positioned to show off that body to great effect. Not only is the body revealed in a pleasing manner, but it is done so in such a way that only the body is lit, or at least that the body has a strong highlight relative to everything else on stage.

To achieve this effect, lights are used that sit low to the stage floor between the head height of the dancer and their shin. These lights are typically focused to illuminate the body of the dancer while everything else remains dark. When used on their own, this can have the effect of making the dancer appear to float, as if by magic, upon the void of the stage.

A wonderful benefit of this kind of lighting comes from the fact that the performer is lit but the stage floor is not. As such, the floor may then be treated in any manner desirable by the lighting designer, through the use of color, texture or intensity. In a careful design of light on the floor a designer may create an infinite array of emotional landscapes upon which the brilliantly lit performer moves.

One trouble with this kind of lighting for many stage plays is that the look can be quite severe. While showing the body off nicely, it also gives a very high contrast look that includes many shadows. Typically a dark line appears down the front center of the body where the light is obscured by various body parts, such as the nose.

In order to avoid this effect, many plays that employ sidelighting will use lights from overhead. This has the benefit of maintaining the sculptural quality of sidelighting while at the same time allowing the light itself to illuminate the whole human form. Using just high angle sidelighting will still give a sharp look, but not at the expense of basic visibility of the human face.

As the angle of the light increases it hits the stage floor harder and the sidelight begins to wash out the effect of any backlight and top light design on the floor itself. The designer must take this into account and determine ahead of time how the sidelighting will mix with the backlighting ideas. This can be used with wonderful results when designing a low light through trees. The dappled light on the floor and the performer can reinforce the feel of an afternoon sun more so than if the two were independent.

Because the same basic function can be achieved, revealing the sculptural qualities of the human form, through any combination of sidelight angles, the designer has the flexibility to decide if they want that light to impact the design of the floor and if so, to what extent. In many ways, then, sidelighting has more variations and possibilities than any other lighting angle.

Tags: angle, design, theory

This entry was posted on Monday, June 22nd, 2009 at 20:12 and is filed under design, theory. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.