From the course: Pro Video Tips

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Comparing ratios

Comparing ratios

From the course: Pro Video Tips

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Comparing ratios

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I'm going to talk about how we use a light meter to measure lighting ratios in a minute, but first let's just take a look at some of the different lighting ratios and talk about the mood that they achieve starting from the lowest lighting ratio which is one-to-one. A one-to-one lighting ratio is when the key light and the fill lights are of equal brightness. Because they are both equally bright they essentially fill in the shadow that each would otherwise be casting. So when you have a one-to-one lighting ratio your image will look very flat. When the key light and fill light are evenly matched like this, it's called high-key lighting and it creates a very flat look because there are no real shadows or dark areas to give a sense of depth or texture in high-key lighting. Sitcoms, soap operas and morning talk shows all generally use flatter high-key lighting. The main reason for this isn't aesthetics as well as practicality. The big advantage of one-to-one high-key lighting for these…

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