Light and Shadow

Photography literally means "light writing" and cameras can capture that which is written by light. In this sense, photographers are not "light writers" at all; they are more akin to explorers, discoverers of the "words" left by light. Let there be light!

Isn't it interesting that light is emphasized by darkness? The obverse is also true. Light illuminates the darkness; light "writes" on darkness. Differences in light and dark, we call their relationship "contrast" and gradations in contrast lead to interesting shadows. In terms of illumination, contrast and shadow cannot exist separately, one without the other. In this, I find shadows fascinating, both metaphorically and photographically.

Another interesting fact is that light is understood as a duality, wave and particle simultaneously. I am not going to get all quantum mechanical on you although that too is fascinating, but light and dark, contrast and shadow also represent dualities; I wonder if the duality of light itself has anything to do with that.

As an aside, photoreceptors in our eyes can perceive different wavelengths of light as colors, but in this blog, I am going to consider only light and shadow in the absence of color.

We have some clerestory windows in our house and they open to the rising sun. Every morning with my coffee, I watch the path of the light coming through, each day different, and wonder if I could have figured out that these differences arise from earth's motion around the sun. So far, I think I've rationalized how I could use these pathways as a calendar, but I haven't yet come up with a way to intuit our position on the surface of a planetary ball hurtling through space around a relatively massive fusion furnace emitting literally tons of light! Undaunted, I watch the light and the shadows produced by it.

I find one of these "light-shadow" patterns particularly intriguing for some reason. It is formed by light streaming through a square window and intersecting a metal candelabra that has glass candle holders; the shadow is projected onto a plaster wall. I have photographed this shadow numerous times with varied success, but how do you photograph a shadow? For one thing, you can't focus on it because shadows are fuzzy due to diffraction. Why does light bend when it passes an edge? To answer this question requires quantum theory, but I digress! The only way to focus on a shadow is to focus upon the surface struck by the light and upon which the shadow is projected. Even this is an illusion, but it turns out to be adequate for our purposes. Thus, Ansel Adams' "sharp image of a fuzzy concept" seems to be impossible in practical terms. We see through a glass darkly. That realization notwithstanding, I present my best effort to date, below.

Shadow Replay

Switching gears, sometimes there's too much light. Photographically speaking, this often occurs during a bright and sunny mid-day. Such was troubling me during my recent visit to Canyon de Chelly while I was lamenting the fact we'd already missed the "best" light, golden hour; besides, it was hot as we were hiking down into the canyon. Then I had an "ah-ha!" moment that would have been obvious to others, but was a new revelation to me. One of the features of photographs taken during the magic (golden) hours is the contrast provided by the oblique angle of light, which lends definition to a scene, dimensionality, texture. Of course, the light is much, much warmer as well, but I was contemplating monotone renderings, so color temperature wasn't really a consideration. Here's the epiphany: at midday, vertical surfaces would provide that oblique "angle of attack" for the available light, so I started to look for nice examples of light and shadow. Hey, just trying to make lemonade!

The near vertical walls of the canyon provided ample subject matter. I began really seeing and occasionally snapping examples that called to me. Particularly alluring were those candidates that might suggest I wasn't shooting in the middle of the day at all and where the light would perhaps gently sculpt a surface, lending soft texture. Of course, this faux-twilight effect is not the only possibility; interesting patterns of light and dark also called to me. While the contrast of such captures might be somewhat harsh, I was on a search for just the right highlights with just the right shadows. I have found a few of those, which can be seen on my website.

But back to faux-twilight. You see this in some photographs of sand dunes where the gently rolling slopes gradually attenuate the light at certain angles and contribute to wonderfully soft, graded shadows. At least, that was what I was thinking when I captured the image below. We had reached the bottom of the canyon and were taking photos of what is known as the White House (see previous blog posting). While scanning the cliff face with my telephoto lens, I spied some symbols carved into the rock, topped by a sublimely soft streak of light lending some texture and contrast to the surface.

Symbols and Light

For some reason, my imagination was captured by the provocative juxtaposition of man-made symbols with natural illumination cascading down the sandstone. As I pondered this, it occured to me that the symbols themselves were illuminated by reflected light. Symbols, like the letters and words on this page, like the ancient pictographs, also are a form of light; an inner reflected light that seeks to capture the sum of our experience, our hopes, our fears, a light that we innately seek to share with others. To me, all of this seems (or seemed) interconnected somehow, the natural light and these glimmers of human understanding. Perhaps light from without is intertwined with light from within, both illuminate the darkness, but we wouldn't appreciate it, wouldn't even really notice it, if it weren't for the shadows.

I hope you have enjoyed this little essay and apologize if some of this seems like too much of a lecture, not meant to be, just sharing thehappenstance of thoughts that occur along the trail of my photographic journey. If you like the blog, please subscribe and/or share on your social media. If you'd like to be removed from the modest emailing list, just let me know or send me to spam!