Light Painting Tutorial

Want to light paint like we did here?

It’s easy! Here’s what you need:

1. A camera that can do long exposures, or has a “bulb” mode. You can do this with a camera that does 10-30 second long exposures as well. Any DSLR will do this, and a lot of point-and-shoot cameras will have a manual or “shutter priority” mode.
2. A tripod, or a way to lock your camera down.
3. Lights! Flashlights, LED lights, anything – these will be your “brushes”
4. A dark room, or nighttime
5. If you want to be super fancy, a camera flash (or just another camera that has a flash!

The idea behind light painting is that if you open the shutter, you can draw lines by moving the flashlight around in front of the lens. So hold the shutter open, get in front, and try drawing something in the air. If you have a camera flash, you can have someone stand in place, and flash them. Then have them hold still and draw around them. Experiment!

Some tips:

• If it’s not pitch black, cover the lens between moments when you’re drawing. That way you don’t accidentally overexpose your frame.
• Point the lights at the camera, but not necessarily directly at the lens – doing that might blow out the frame and get unwanted flares.
• If you don’t have a flash, you can light things up by moving the flashlight beam slowly over the entirety of what you’re trying to light. The longer you shine a light at a certain area, the brighter it’ll be in the final image
• Set your aperture to as high as it goes, and your ISO to as low as it goes. This’ll minimize ambient light from the environment.
• If you’re doing painting, wear dark clothing so that you don’t show up in the final shot.