Through the years, we’ve been given contradictory advice regarding “The Light.” While accounts of near death experiences suggest “going towards the light,” the scary-as-hell “Don’t go into the Light” scene from the 1982 movie Poltergeist, strongly suggests the opposite.
Deeper considerations on the subject take me back to 6th grade and an impressive solar eclipse of the sun. The entire class was buzzing with excitement and activity. We were about to make scientific history by turning ordinary old shoe-boxes into pinhole cameras to tract the progress of the moon across the face of the sun! It seemed like the happiest day ever until our teacher, in a very loud and serious voice announced, “Half of you will probably be blind by the end of the day!” If this was her way of getting our attention, it worked. She then went on to explain something about photons, harmful rays and how many Amazon children would never see again because nobody was there to tell them “don’t look into the sun!” Buzz kill was not in my vernacular at the time but it accurately described how I felt. I no longer wanted to make a shoebox camera. Instead, I sat in a dark corner, thought about the doomed Amazon children and ate raisins. Eventually, with considerable urging from the teacher, I agreed to work on my shoebox as long as I could spend the rest of the day wearing the shop teacher’s welding helmet. For the record, none of my classmates were blinded that day, but Willy Henderson did spill his chocolate milk on his corduroys.
Photography is about light. Light provides us with photographic opportunities and options. While side lighting gives depth to scenes and portraits, back lighting can produce nice separation edge-light on our subjects, cool looking shadows in the foreground, evoke moods and create interesting colorful flares.
While the sun can harm our eyes, it also provides us with amazing light to illuminate our photo subjects. It is both our most important celestial body and our best and free lighting tool that we all share. Use it wisely.