Hemisphere of Light

Dave really thinks about his lighting for television, constantly battling with the tension between what is technically possible and what his creative eye really wants to produce, in spite of the limitations of the medium and the budget. He still does, improving, to his credit, even specialist programmes such as poker, or indoor bowls.

Years ago, whenever possible, I used to book him as a resident guest lecturer on the lighting courses I ran. He brought his unique style to the learners, imparting hard-won secrets freely and generously to those learners whose knowledge, skill and experience fell far short of his, challenging, then empowering them, to produce a quality of pictures they never thought possible.

One of Dave’s original lighting theories was developed after countless critical observations of how light behaves in real life, as well as studying the craft by which those old Dutch Masters of painterly illumination constructed their interior scenes. He'd experimented with what could be done, in the genre called "Drama", to make sets, scenery and faces look natural in the artificial space of a TV studio. Dave introduced me to the term “Hemisphere of light”. It referred to the mushrooming, ballooning, and scattering in all directions of light through a window. Light shines up, as well as left, right and down. Look for yourself next time.

I was instantly reminded of Dave’s thesis when I saw this nicotine stained ceiling in a Malvern pub, uplit by said hemisphere of window-smashing photons. Dave and I sat supping and story-telling, satisfied with good ale, still interested in the fine details of our surroundings.

Q.E.D.