Light, color, and distance

Lately, I have been a little bewildered by my apartment's view of the golf course across the street. When I look at the golf course through the window, I can see the wide field adn the trees in the background, but for some reason the color seems off. Although the grass is a very bright green right next to the street, in the distance the grass seems to change color, but this doesn't seem to be from natural causes. The coloring of the trees also seems off. The trees and grass in the distance seem to almost have a whitish haze over them, making them lighter colored than the closer foliage. This seems odd because the fact that they are in an open space would mean that more light is hitting them, which I would expect wound make them brighter. My only guess is that this lighter color is due to reflection. Since a golf course needs to have high quality grass, I would guess that the grass gets watered often and thus would probably still have some water droplets on it. My guess is that this affects the reflection of light in some way, possibly allowing it to reflect more colors and give a whiter color. However, this doesn't seem right because the trees would not have the same amount of water on them. I also can guess that this fading of color is just due to the distance, but I do not know that for sure. This made me wonder how distance could be applied to theatre and studio art, and I realized that designers and painters generally use a color change to signify distance. I would just like to know how this works exactly so that I can use the technique in my Our Town project.

Lightbulbs

Earlier today my dad came into my room to give me new lightbulbs because he took mine the other day. I got hands on and started changing my lightbulbs, and I started thinking about lighting class! (Cheesy, but true.) My lightbulbs are A-type and they have a white powder on the inside of the glass so the filament isn't seen. I looked at the old lightbulb and I realized that the powder was fading and at one spot on the bulb it was even gone. It made me wonder how that happens. At least now, I have light in my room!

Apartment Hallway Lights

The hallways in my apartment building are yellow and kind of blank since there aren't really paintings on the sides of the walls.

But the lights on the ceiling make it so there are upsidedown "U" shapes on the wall, making for texture in the halls, and making the halls a little more architecturally dynamic. I thought this was especially interesting because otherwise, the halls would look flat, and even though the walls are flat, the upsidedown "U" shapes make the hall kind of "pop." (not sure if that's the right word).

-Vin

Shocktoberfest

I don't know where my original post about Shocktoberfest went, but here's another.

What I found interesting about the outdoor stage lights at Shocktoberfest, was that since they were set up day of the event, they were all generally spotlights (maybe Lekos?) that had strong colored gels on them (bright yellows, magentas, purples, greens)that were set up as side lights for dancers. However, what happened was that the side lights washed out the colors of the costumes of the dancers, so all the dancers just looked like splashes of color and a lot of black on stage. This effect got worse as the night fell and took out the natural sunlight that still preserved some of the color of the costumes.

-Vin

LACMA

My friends and I went to the LACMA, the LA County Museum of Art, and the most touristy part of the museum that doesn't cost any money are the street lamps that are outside the museum. During the say, the lights are not exactly visible, but when night arrives, they are some of the most beautiful lamps I've ever seen. The contrast between the night sky and the lamps are amazing. A lot of the light is visible throughout the whole museum so when we walked back to the parking area, the lights around the lamps glowed, giving an angelic glow to the lamps. It was really a great sight to see and I'm glad that the LACMA uses light as an art form.

Knott's Scary Farm!

So I got to go to Knott's Berry Farm for the first time in my life a couple days ago...and I love it. I didn't get to do everything I wanted, so I'm definitely looking to go again. Anyway, because I went at night to the "Scary Farm", I got to see all sorts of cool lighting and effects.

The first thing you walk into (Ghost Town or something?) hits you with lasers and fog, dimming your vision and creating an eerie presence. The lasers are interesting, but what I noticed more of where down lights that created unique pools of light in certain areas. They came in an assortment of colors, and with the fog around them, the pools of light on the ground looked like muddied waters you had to walk through (ie, swampy). The other effect of these lights was that you could not see anything beyond them, and once you past through, some monster would jump out at you.

The other interesting thing I noted about the lighting here was the placement/lack of lights. When you walked through the mazes (which were not mazes...) they would give only enough light to guide you through, and sometimes not even that. They also used light manipulatively, forcing your eyes to look at one thing while something from the dark went "Boo!" I noticed a fairly even split between top lights and down lights - the top lights creating odd pools of light (again) and the down lights focusing your eyes and pointing out the "creepy" things.

If you haven't been to Knott's, I suggest going, you won't be scared most likely, but the effects are neat (mostly) and you can tell there is a lot of time and effort put into making the park the way it is. Plus, if you like roller coasters, you'll love the one's at Knott's.

Strolls Through Balboa Park

I went home this past weekend to go see Rocky Horror Show at the Old Globe and Hair's National Tour with my favorite lady back home, Haley. We saw a matinee performance of Rocky and decided to go on a walk through the park. If you're not familiar with San Diego, CA's Balboa Park, it has a lot of museums and Spanish architecture. My favorite time of day is when the sun starts going down and the lights start to come on. Haley and I walked around, being cheesy and romantic, and sometimes stopping to take pictures with my DSLR. Being a goof and wanting to impress her, I told her about lights and how intensity, color, etc. can change the atmosphere. I would have gone into the Rayleigh scattering, but the clouds had rolled in. Perhaps I'll save it for a beach sunset. It's wicked cheesy, I know, but whatever. Anyway, we were just sitting and I took in the lighting in the breezeways of all the buildings and how the color was very amber and the mood was warm. I then imagined if they used bright fluorescent. The imaginary breezeway in my head had a completely different mood. It was bland, almost irritating and very unpleasant. If I had taken Haley for a walk then, it would not have been as pleasant of a walk. We also looked at how they lit the buildings' architecture at night. There were a lot of shadows and texture. The buildings had an entirely different kind of beauty to them that you cannot find during the day when the contrast of light and shadow was diffused and less dramatic. I'm a night person, so I enjoyed being in the quiet park looking at the buildings. I grew up in San Diego and spent a lot of summers in the park, but I never get tired of seeing everything. Plus, I had a better appreciation for the lights I did see when I went there since I've started this class. Haley and I took a few pictures, but we left the park before it got too dark. Here are a few pictures from both the day, which was cloudy, resulting in very diffused light, and at the beginning of the sunset with all the mood lighting:

Jess A

Le Footlights

Over the past two weeks I have been fulfilling my 101 credits by hanging up the lights for UCI's production of "Le Misanthrope" by Moliere. I learned a lot about lighting and I had other enlightening endeavors: the yolk bolt is a stubborn bit and won't loosen without killing one's arm, panning and tilting means pretending that a source 4 is a prison yard light searching for runaways, and a ladder is something to conquer your fears with.

I particularly had a great time turning the footlights on. It felt great seeing all of our hard work turn on after our seemingly sloppy yet crafty work. We literally took a part the wires on the connectors (some pin and some twist-lock) while perfecting our handiwork with a screwdriver, and with our bare hands twisted naked copper wires with the designated "hot" and "neutral" wires, with a slight fear of electrocution.

I would definitely do e-hang again, and maybe e-run just to feel powerful as I light up the stage.

Kristine

The Joy of Compact Fluorescent Light Bulbs

These are the lights in my apartment. When I originally bought this lamp I wasn't putting too much thought into the colors surrounding the bulbs or the fact that the bulbs were compact fluorescents. When I initially plugged in this light and turned it on it gave off a very warm and orange/pink hue. After hearing about the very blue hue that compact fluorescents give off on their own I started to think about why the manufacturer added the colored bowls that surround each bulb. Could this have been an effort to resolve the fluorescent blue hue and create a warmer atmosphere? Quite possibly it could have been.

Another thought popped to mind as i turned on these lights. They have three settings: a low setting where only two bulbs turn on, a medium setting where three bulbs turn on and a high setting that turns on all the bulbs. Since each bulb has a different color surrounding it that acts as a kind of gel, the additive color mixing created by each setting is quite different. You get different versions of warm tones depending on what setting you are on and which direction the bulbs are pointed.

There are so many options with this light because it is flexible. I could point the lights to create a type of asymmetrical trough that directs the light upwards on the wall (like lighting up a backdrop) or I could point the lights directly at an object. All of these positions and colors give this light a lot of diversity in effect that has the potential to create a different mood in the room.

Different light levels

This weekend my aunt, uncle, and cousin came to visit me in Irvine. We went out to Buca di Beppo, which is, of course, highly decorated and, no matter the location, tries to create a homey, familiar feeling. While I’ve always noticed how the excess of decorations and the deep, rich color choices add to the atmosphere, I never realized that the lighting does as well. When we were first sitting down I didn’t really notice the light level. Soon, however, someone slightly turned the lights down in the area where we were sitting. The room immediately seemed smaller and more intimate. This fits with their family-style Italian meals. Dimming the lights both made everyone sitting at the table feel closer to each other, and also seemed to separate our table from the others, so we had a sense of privacy. This also reminds me of when I would eat at Pippin my freshman year; in the mornings, or whenever there were not a lot of people there, they would play music, but when there were a lot of people, they did not. I always got the sense that the music was used to make people feel like they had privacy in their conversations (there was a buss of noise around them, not just silence). When there were a lot of people, and a lot of talking, adding music would have just been too much noise, and the echoing of the voices in the dining area was enough to cover up people’s conversations.

After lunch, when my aunt and cousin came in to see my apartment, I rushed around to turn on every light and open all of the windows, which I never normally do. I realized as I did this that I was trying to make the apartment look as large as possible, and as bright and clean as I could. My apartment has white walls and light tan carpets, so I felt that making it brighter would highlight his. It is interesting how changes in the levels of lighting can greatly change one’s perception of a space. Also, how lighting needs to match a room. Buca di Beppo would look silly if it was brightly lit with a cool colored light, and my apartment would look wrong if it was too dark or lit with too warm of a light.

Lighting in restaurants

In the last week, I have noticed the way businesses try to use light to create an inviting environment and fail miserably. I work in a relatively new restaurant and previously worked at The Cheesecake Factory at the Irvine Spectrum. When I was at Cheesecake, I would get so annoyed with the lighting during my weekend evening shifts because the restaurant would get gradually darker throughout the night, until all the lights were so low that I was tempted to curl up and sleep because I was so tired from my shift. I would often get complaints from guests about the lights be too low or not being able to read the menu. I thought that this was a problem that only Cheesecake had, and I figured that my managers thought that they were stylish or trendy. Then I started working at another restaurant and noticed the same thing. Every night at around 7 pm, the lights seem to go to half, and the restaurant gets bathed in an eery orange glow. This make the restaurant appear simultaneously sinister and cozy, depending on which shadows you look at. In the areas closer to a strong source of light, such as the tables near the patio, there are longer shadows that appear eerie and forbidding. However, in the more central areas of the restaurant where there are fewer strong light sources, the light makes the room appear cozy and almost womb-like. I would assume that this is to make the restaurant appear inviting, but honestly I do not see what the light has to do with food. More importantly, if guests are not able to see the menu, it does not matter how cozy the light is if they cannot order food. Even worse, darkness means that guests will not be able to fully observe the artistic presentation of their food, and their expensive meal will feel more like a blind taste test in darkness. Personally, I believe that the ideal lighting in a restaurant is to have one candle centerpiece on each table to get the best of both worlds - giving enough light to read the menu and establish a sense of private lit space while keeping the light from spreading and making the space feel cheap and impersonal. Guests deserve light for safety, aesthetic appreciation, and reading purposes but darkness does create an inviting sense of familiarity and mystery.

I hate flourescents

Ever since I moved into my apartment two months ago, I have had fun decorating and trying to turn it in a fun and homey place. For the most part I was successful, finding decorative posters and furniture that made the place look far more sophisticated than the average college apartment. However, at night the place never seems to look the way I want it to look. Although my living room, bathroom, and bedroom always look cozy and inviting, for some reason my kitchen always looks disgusting. When I come home at night, the first thing I always notice is how sickeningly bright the light is in my kitchen and how it highlights every little speck of dust, food, and trash my roommates have left out. Even worse, the time I came home to find a roach in the kitchen the bright lights seemed to emphasize it even more. All the rest of the rooms in my apartment always look good at night with the lights on, so I wondered why my kitchen always looks so gross at night. I finally realized why this was when I studied the different kinds of lights for the 50C midterm - the kitchen is the only room with flourescents, and I think they look disgusting.

Honestly, I do not need that much light in the kitchen. With light that bright, I feel like every little detail is under scrutiny, and the light is trying to highlight everything that is wrong. I do not need that much light to cook. The light just emits this sickening yellow-white color that seems to make my white cabinets, white counter, and light gray tile glow even more white, which just makes everything that is white (like dust or bugs) pop out. While this is great for cleaning, it is not what I want to be greeted with when I come home at night. If I want that much light to clean, I will just clean during the day and use the natural light from the window. I prefer the less bright glow from the rest of the lamps in my apartment, that make it feel warm and cozy, rather than making me feel like I am under scrutiny. Although I may not use all of the information from the midterm in my regular life, at least it explains why I hate my kitchen light.

Pictures don't do this justice. But this is what the sky looked like on my drive up to Nor Cal this weekend. I think this was just on the other side of Salinas or something like that. But me and my friend just couldn't stop taking pictures and looking and the pink clouds!

So then I tried explaining the thing we learned in class about how we get a sky that's both orange and dark blue at the same time, and that blue scatters faster than reds and oranges, and I can tell you that I don't think that I explained it very well, because by the end, I was confused. Haha. But when I thought about it for a minute, it somehow clicked that the frequencies are different therefore, faster frequencies, blue, scatter faster than slower. It was a very big 'DUH!' moment.

Anyhoo, the sky was really pretty. Haha. But then it got dark, and it was cloudy all weekend in Berkeley, so we didn't see much of this after that. =]

Campus at Night

 I took some pictures of the campus at nighttime while walking to UTC with my sister. I used to take lighting for granted and think: "They're just there to light the way in the dark." But walking through the campus at night, I realized how decorative the lighting around campus is. It not only plays a functional role but an aesthetic role as well. 

I've always found the Science Library (Now the Ayala Library) to be the most beautiful at nighttime. I could always tell if people were in the library because many of the lights inside have motion sensors. 

One thing I noticed about the lights around campus is that the harsh "orange" lights (I want to say "incandescent") are used mainly for lighting up an area and the "white" lights (I'm guessing "fluorescent") are used not only for lighting but also for decorative purposes. 

My LED Light

So I have finally decided to post about my infamous LED light. I got it at Target for $25 dollars. I'm really happy that it is energy efficient because conservation is very important to me! Because my eyes are very used to incandescent bulbs, the bright white light of the lamp was a bit harsh for my eyes especially reflected off of the white pages of a book. to fix this, I was inspired by the use of gels so I improvised by using tape, coloring it with an orange Sharpie and pasting it on the light bulb. I was concerned that the tape would melt because of the heat but conveniently, LED bulbs don't get too hot! I will provide pictures for your entertainment!

First Blog Post

I had difficulty coming up with a post this week. It made me realize how much I take lighting for granted. I notice it, sure, but hardly ever appreciate it. After class today I tried paying attention to as much lighting as I could. Nothing struck me as incredible, or overwhelming, and it wasn't until I got back to my apartment that I really thought about what I could say. I don't know how many of you live in Camino, but I have to say that the light they provide in the room stinks. I actually noticed that the first day I moved in, but only now did it strike me to write about...frankly...how much the light sucks.

There are two big issues with the light. Firstly, the light takes forever to get bright (which it never fully gets to). This indicates to me that it is a CFL (compact fluorescent), which is great to save energy, but not to provide the light that I need. Second, the light never gets very bright, which I honestly don't know whether that is a problem with the bulb or the glass protector around the bulb. The light is on the ceiling, and the glass around the bulb seems to be pretty thick which I assume has quite a bit of dimming power.

The way I get light into my room is easy during the day, and difficult at night. I have two windows, so during the day there is plenty of natural light to be had. However at night, I have to rely on my bed lamp, which also uses a compact fluorescent bulb, but without anything blocking it (ie glass) it is much brighter. However, being a bedside lamp it really only shoots light in a very specific direction, and I can only light half of my room or so.

I just thought it was interesting that in an otherwise beautifully furnished (and lit) apartment, the light in the bedroom where I spend most of my time is pretty weak. I don't have a camera so I can't show you, but I will try and borrow a friends camera for future blog posts.

Chris Lanehart

Antigone!

Here's a picture from 'Antigone' a few weeks ago. That awesome warm light on Antigone's face? That's me standing back 20 feet shining a flashlight at her. It was really neat to get to do this show for a month in daylight, and then at tech realize that all this beautiful work we've done would be invisible if not for light. So our director came up with the idea of the audience carrying flashlights, so they could follow whichever actor or action they so chose, and I walked along behind them keeping my super-flashlight trained on where the scene is going.

Knowing where the scene was going, however, was never clean cut. At the end when Creon walks back to the palace to kill himself, the audience didn't always know to look at him, and feel the weight of seeing him walk away without a word. So that was one moment where I knew where the audience's eye had to be directed, but for more intimate scenes, where the dialogue is flying between two people and a third is standing by interjecting random comments, it was tricky. I would have to judge who to light based on who the audience as a whole were lighting, as well as my own place in the audience.

Generally, 'Antigone' was an awesome show, and getting to follow them around every night taking notes and flashlighting their faces really opened my eyes to how important light is to productions.

Jessica Evans Irvine

Irv

Jerry the Turtle

My roommate has a turtle named Jerry. As a tiny turtle, he cannot provide his own body heat, and the heat lamp keeps him alive. The lamp gives the light certain angles that I would not have usually seen. The shadow of Jerry is seen under him. I think that the lamp is S-Shape because of the straight sides. Another aspect I thought were interesting were the shadows that are cast around the tank. The outer angle of the tank is completely shrouded in shadows but the top area of the tank is very bright. I just thought the distribution of light was interesting. Just the fact that the light controls Jerry's life is very cool. It helps him live and I guess to him that means that light is his life.

Ever since my parents got me my first DSLR, I have been playing with all the settings. One of my favorite things to do is set the camera on a tripod or something solid so that the camera doesn't move at all and then set the shutter speed to a very 'slow' setting. Since the shutter is open for more than a couple seconds, the way the camera captures the light, given some other settings have been adjusted accordingly, makes for some fun pictures. While I have been fascinated by my camera and all the wonderful things it can do, I know that without light, it would be rendered useless, as would a lot of other things. Perhaps, everything. "Photography" itself, translated from Greek, means "drawing with light". In class, we've talked about painting with light. Since I've been dabbling with digital photography, I'm making connections between tools I use in taking and editing my pictures to the tools of lighting design. I've always been fascinated by lighting designs of theatrical productions. I've even been thinking about getting into taking production shots for shows. I know this class will help a lot with that. If I'm going to 'paint' with those lights, I will have to understand them at least a little. I will more than likely appreciate light more than I did before I came here to this class the next time I go out for a good photo session. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to go out and take some slow-shutter-speed pictures since I've been without a decent tripod and time. I do, however have some examples of how these pictures turn out. One is from Christmas last year and the other is a picture I took in New York City. Both involved slower shutter speeds and were very happy occasions, all made better with fun lights.

While walking across campus with my family this weekend we crossed the bridge into the parking structure. On the way, I was looking down at my feet and saw this intriguing set of shadows. We often take advantage of the beautiful things light can do for us even the simplest things as the shadows cast by the foliage around us. What was so intriguing about these shadows was the gradient of color they allow. Some of the edges are harsh while others are soft and fading. For some reason, this made me think of a kind of natural gobo, blocking the light and casting a design onto a backdrop. It made me consider the potential for gobos and the vast amount of uses they could have.

Drawing

Last week in Costume Design 50A, we learned some basic drawing techniques to help us with our weekly sketches. We were told to actually look at the light and shadow and how it reflects off the objects. I was surprised how this attention to detail actually helped my sketches look somewhat decent.

When our professor was setting up white objects to draw, he turned off the overhead lights so only the side light from the windows were illuminating the objects, casting more shadows. I thought it was a little ironic to try to make shadows. The limited experience I have with lighting design, the designer is usually trying to eliminate shadows from the actor so he can be seen.

I think this quarter is going to change the way I see light.

My Big Apple

I was looking through my vacation pictures of New York in 2009 over Christmas and I found two really cool pictures, which I hadn't paid much attention to until I started this lighting class. These multi-pointed, star-shaped lights at the Columbus Circle Mall in New York City change lights constantly and they are beautiful, especially during Christmas time. This reminded me of what Jaymi said about the Los Angeles Airport LED lights. All of this also made me think of how unspectacular Times Square, Broadway, and all the other amazing things in New York would be without light. It's up to you New York. We love you. :)

Rainbow

So today for those who were lucky enough to be outside around 6ish the clouds parted a little bit showing some sunlight, thus creating a rainbow. The quality of the pic sucks but I'm sure you can still make it out.

London at Twilight

This is a photo of London I took while studying abroad during this past summer. I sometimes found it difficult to take pictures of buildings in London because the light would always silhouette the architecture and they would all come out too dark in the photos. So this was one of those moments when the lighting was just right and set the right mood (at least in my opinion). The buildings are dim but there are just enough tinges of pink (very slight) and brightness behind the architecture to contrast the coolness of the colors and balance out the image. The colors and lighting create a drowsy "twilight" atmosphere where the viewer cannot tell if the sun is setting or rising.          

Ordinary Sunset

I was going to Target last week, when I looked up and saw this sunset from the parking lot. It was beautiful, so I took a photo from my car window. I’ve always loved the way that palm trees look silhouetted at dusk. It makes you realize what a dramatic shape they have. But more than that, I was struck by how everyone was just continuing to go about their business in the shopping center without noticing it, just as I had been. It’s something that we’re so used to. Like Stacey said below, the light is different wherever you are, and it’s amazing that this really is just a normal So Cal Sunset. I studied abroad this summer and I definitely noticed the different clouds there, and the way the light played off of them.

God Light

I took a road trip with my boyfriend this summer to Colorado and got to drive through Nevada, Arizona, Utah, and New Mexico. The drive was so beautiful particularly through Utah and New Mexico. As a lighting designer I was in heaven because the light in these states are so different from California, in a magical way. Well, on my way home we stopped at a gas station and when I looked up there was this gorgeous cloud with the sun beaming through it. I attempted to capture the rays peeking out as best I could and this picture was the result. Hope you enjoy it as much as I do :).

Stroll to Gina's

I was taking a walk to Gina's the other day when I realised the value of the great outdoors and the natural lighting that exists without fluorescent bulbs. The lighting was simply spectacular, casting shadows on the sidewalk with a high contrast because of the overcast sky. The colours weren't so vivid, except the typical Irvine (probably spray-painted) green grass, but it seemed that the lighting created more of a white overlay to the sky which made the colours seem more vivid than they actually were.

Considering that it was about 4 pm, I expected there to be a bit more of a sunset, but then again I'm never really good at predicting when the sun is going to set. There was a fresh feel to the day, despite the fact that it was late afternoon, and I have the feeling that the fresh feel was due to the fact that the sun was muted by clouds.

Lights at the District

I don't have a camera :(

But when I went to The District, I noticed how many ambiance lights they used to decorate the place, and attract shoppers. There are lights on the side of the building that light diamond shaped light on the wall and the side of the building with the name "The District" in block letters had color changing washes across the board. There were also neon light signs indicating where the different restaurants were.

-Vin

Spots

I was looking into the light on my fan (to try and come up with something to write about) and while I was staring my eyes started to water so I looked away. I then realized that when I looked away I could still see the four little halos of light. It happens all the time but its never something I notice unless its the flash of a camera on a black night. I just thought it was cool/intense how powerful these tiny little bulbs are!

Fluorescent Lighting

So... Saturday evening, I had to be admitted to the hospital for something (not the point). But while I was laying there with my head pounding, I couldn't help but look up and notice how much I wanted the lights to go away!

And I know people always say it, but fluorescent lighting is really not flattering at all. It made everyone I saw look pale. And there was this odd, what seemed like, blue tinge to everyone's faces. It was disgusting. So when someone asked if I wanted the lights off, I couldn't help but be thankful. It was weird... And gross.

K

Dead Lamp

The only lamp I brought from home died.

The poor thing burnt out with a cute "pooomf" sound while I was reading. I am now secretly using my room mate's lamp at night.

It looks like the filament got overheated since the bulb looks black. I should have listened to the warning signs: the eerie white noise it was making, the way it was cooking my head when sitting under it, and the way it burnt the tag on my pillow. RIP Lampy.

Kristine