COLOUR THEORY

Mike Harris shows you how to use multi-coloured lighting panels for a science fiction-styled shoot that’s out of this world

For this Crash Course we headed to an uncharted area of south-east England for a sci-fi-themed portrait shoot, courtesy of The Creativity Hub (see www.creativityhubevents.com for upcoming events). As we photographed a series of futuristic scenes that wouldn't look out of place in a Philip K Dick novel we had some of the very best lighting kit that Rotolight has to offer at our disposal. Most exciting of all were the lighting specialist's new AEOS 2 and NEO 3 LED panels. These both provide 4 HOURS continuous lighting, which we made good use of, and high-speed RGB flash, making them ideal solutions for filmmakers and photographers alike.

Each light can be controlled via a neat little touchscreen and a pair of command wheels, allowing you to cycle through a whopping 2500 digital filters with ease. In fact, these lights can emit almost any colour you can think of (16.7 million to be exact). This completely removes the need to lug around gels - and since you can change the colour of the lighting at the tap of a screen, it's much easier to experiment with your lighting on the fly.

If you're just getting into portrait photography then pro-grade lighting equipment probably isn't practical or affordable, but lighting skills are entirely transferable, so you can just use what's available to you. You can purchase affordable gel attachments for flashguns and heads - some particularly resourceful photographers swear by making their own - or you could try using a regular desk lamp to create a low-key portrait.