April 23, 2015
Lighting
A 2002 film called A Walk to Remember directed by Adam Shankman is about a fearless, mischievous, cocky teenage boy whom finds himself getting into some trouble. This trouble leads him to a kind- hearted, intelligent young lady. Landon (Shane West) at first uses this young lady Jamie (Many Moore) for her brain, but eventually he lets his heart do the talking. Toward the end of the movie Landon finds out that the young lady he fell in love with is dying from Leukemia. He does everything he can to show Jamie how much he truly loves her. He showed his unconditional love by putting his tough, popular side away and loving Jamie for who she truly was. The first type of lighting that came to mind after reading through the differences between high-key lighting, low-key lighting and three-point lighting is the scene toward the middle of the movie when Landon and Jamie are in a play. I feel this type of lighting is three-point lighting. However, I feel at different parts of the movie different types of lighting are used.
This scene is an example of low-key lighting. The scene is dark, so it makes the audience feel like their right in the movie with the characters. The darkness helps to make the audience feel the "romantic mood" and sentiments that Jamie and Landon are sharing.
While watching this movie I noticed that the cinematographer is carefully controlling the shadows of each character. Three-point lighting includes two sources of light, one on each side of the camera in front of the character. One of these lights is called the key light and the other is called the fill light. The key light is approximately located at a 45 degree angle. When you think of the term "key" you think of the most important. The key light in a film is what provides the most light from one angle. The key light creates an incredibly rough shadow on the characters face. The fill light is located on the other side of the camera and is used to then fill the shadows just right so the shadows aren't completely taken away. With the key light and the fill light working together, a three-dimensional look is made to the characters faces. The final light that is used in the three-point lighting is a backlight. The backlight is located behind the character that focuses (shines) on the characters head and shoulders. This backlight provides the cinematographer a bright light called a rimlight that makes the character stand out more than anything else. When you watch this scene, Jaime pops right out as she sings dtue to this lighting. If you notice, the shots of this scene always have either both Jamie and Landon together,
This picture shows one of the scenes that has high-key lighting. The picture is very bright and clear.
The benefits of each style of lighting used makes the audience be able to feel what the characters are feeling. The first clip of the characters outside with the telescope is a dramatic scene because in this part of the scene Landon tells Jamie that he had a star named after her. She is amazed at this gesture and is overjoyed. In the video clip provided Landon and Jamie were in a school play together. The Three-point lighting was used so the audience could see each character and focus on them rather than what's around them. In my opinion this is when Landon truly realized that he was madly in love with Jamie. The third picture is when Jamie and Landon get married. The bright scene shows the audience of their happiness.
All the different types of lighting contributed as a team and made the movie into a beautiful love story. I was intrigued by the whole movie and I felt like I was a living character in the movie by the way the lighting mixed with the plot and story of the film.
The lighting techniques suited the general genre of the film because this was a romantic and drama filled film. There were happy times, sad times, funny times and times where you just wanted to jump through the screen. Each type of lighting that was used in this film seemed bright during the happy times, dark in the sad and dramatic times and then also focused on the serious and crucial parts of the film.
I feel that if the film would have only used one type of lighting such as low-key lighting then the theme of the whole movie would have been all sad and serious. With the high-key lighting the whole movie would be based on just happy moments and the plot of the story would not match the lighting. If three-point lighting would have been the only lighting used then the focus would be on particular characters instead of everyone. Each character had their own part in this film.
References:
http://i.ytimg.com/vi/0nAj47dg9Gg/hqdefault.jpg
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/77/f4/10/77f410edebd6224a2f88dc3449837ad4.jpg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v27UT5sEZiI
Jessica Burdick
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