Home › Forums › Explore Media › Watercolor › The Learning Zone › New Member Question About Lighting
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February 9, 2019 at 10:15 am #468882
I’m new to the watercolor world, but love it so far! I’m setting up a nice home studio, and know lighting is important. Does anyone have recommendations on lighting? I believe I may want some type of artist/architecture desk lamp. Thanks.
February 9, 2019 at 10:36 am #779011Well…lighting is very important, both to paint by and to include in one’s paintings.
For many painters, painting adjacent to windows and plentiful natural light is a classic approach.
For artificial lighting, one needs sufficient color balanced light to see and enable dependable color mixing on one’s palette and application on the paper. This typically means more than one single light source.
Be sure to check and use “natural light” or balanced lamps for painting with artificial illumination.
Good luck!
Sling paint,
VirgilSling paint,
Virgil Carter
http://www.virgilcarterfineart.com/February 9, 2019 at 4:16 pm #779010Not everyone has a space with good natural light available, so a “balanced” desk lamp is usually required. I have an old LuXo brand Drafting light, that has a round flourescent bulb and a regular incandescent bulb combination, which provides a balanced form of lighting. Unfortunately, these lamps are over $200 these days.
Cheap Joe’s art supply offers daylight bulbs you can use in flood lamp housings, which could work for you. They also have Artist lamps that sell in the $150-$200 range, if you have the budget. You could also look at a used office furniture place to see if they have a duo-lamp drafting light like the Luxo lamp.Rich
February 9, 2019 at 5:46 pm #779012One reason that lighting is so important is that it can change the appearance of your painting. Painting under balanced light, natural daylight f possible gives color that will look best under the widest variety of display lighting conditions.
If you paint under light that has a yellow or blue cast, as many non-balanced bulbs will, it can distort your painting colors as you unconsciously compensate for the color of the light. When you then display the work under different lighting conditions it can look “off”.
It is not just lighting snobs trying to sell you special painting lamps.
"Let the paint be paint" --John Marin
February 9, 2019 at 5:59 pm #779013One reason that lighting is so important is that it can change the appearance of your painting. Painting under balanced light, natural daylight f possible gives color that will look best under the widest variety of display lighting conditions.
If you paint under light that has a yellow or blue cast, as many non-balanced bulbs will, it can distort your painting colors as you unconsciously compensate for the color of the light. When you then display the work under different lighting conditions it can look “off”.
It is not just lighting snobs trying to sell you special painting lamps.
"Let the paint be paint" --John Marin
February 10, 2019 at 12:17 am #779008Appropriate lighting is most similar to outdoor shade. This is around 3000-5000 lumens at a distance of about 2 meters from the work surface. 5000 lumens is 5x 10 watt LED bulbs (most new LED bulbs have 100 lumen/watt LED in them). To avoid glare, the lights should be spread out (or one can install LED batons which last longer).
Get the “daylight” or “cool daylight” LED. This has a color temperature of 6000-6500 Kelvin, which is better than Northern light in the temperate zone which has a bluish cast (10000 K). As for ability to see colors, most new LED have a CRI of about 85, which is less than tungsten/halogen but also will not burn the house down. Good quality (expensive, difficult to obtain) fluorescent bulbs may have a CRI > 90. However, fluorescent bulbs will rapidly diminish in brightness depending on how many times they are switched on and off.
High CRI LED (CRI > 95) is usually around 90 lumens/watt. In normal use, I have not found this 10 CRI difference to be a problem (it is hardly noticeable). Brightness (to judge values correctly) is far more important than color accuracy.
February 11, 2019 at 5:22 am #779016While good daylight 5500k bulbs with good CRI-ratings are important, keep in mind that you can have too-much of a good thing. Too-bright and your work product may be overly-dark under “normal lighting”.
Photography resources have lots of lighting solutions that work also for artists.
Radical Fundemunsellist
February 11, 2019 at 8:50 am #779009Too-bright and your work product may be overly-dark under “normal lighting”.
Photography resources have lots of lighting solutions that work also for artists.
My comment about “outdoor shade” is just a guideline. Obviously if a piece is destined for a dingy corridor, there will be no way to predict that. Ditto for rare works of art that conservationists like to display in the bare minimum lighting possible, which leads one to wonder, why show it at all.
One can, of course, adjust lighting to be same as “indoor shade”, but I have found this a bit limiting and difficult to work with. Consider that many traditional studios had giant windows, including skylights. Even old houses had more windows, both bigger and more in number, than modern houses. And old houses, especially, liked to go overboard with south facing windows (in the northern hemisphere). It does lead one to wonder why artists were fussy about “northern light”, when their patrons would have been completely happy setting it up directly under the southern sun.
However, houses nowadays, seem to have fewer windows and more subdued “mood” lighting (whatever that means). In some cities of the world, sunlight entering a room has become a luxury. The lighting is often not good enough to appreciate a painting, or a photograph. Do we really want the artist to work with such a morbid vision of the end result?
Photography is a bit different than painting. Most editing is now done digitally (which is a whole other can of worms with regards to white point and color correction). As for display of the final print (if there is one), it unfortunately shares the same corner as paintings… lighting is not in the hands of the artist.
February 11, 2019 at 7:17 pm #779015Indraneel- thought provoking comments. We can create under certain lighting conditions, but if we share our work we have no control over the lighting is is viewed by.
I have a room with a south facing window. Lots of light during the day. At night I have some Ikea desk lights and an overhead fluorescent so there is a variety of light. I have not seen that it makes colors look unnatural in paintings that are worked on during daylight and dark.
February 12, 2019 at 10:56 am #779014My recommendation is to also design your lighting around your painting process: i.e. do you paint sitting or standing, how large do you paint, do you keep paper flat or at an angle, etc. Good lighting needs to be glare-free and evenly cover your paper, and palette. You can continue to fine-tune it so your painting process can flow smoothly.
Thank you.
- Tesh Parekh
February 13, 2019 at 3:59 am #779007Appropriate lighting is most similar to outdoor shade. This is around 3000-5000 lumens at a distance of about 2 meters from the work surface. 5000 lumens is 5x 10 watt LED bulbs (most new LED bulbs have 100 lumen/watt LED in them). To avoid glare, the lights should be spread out (or one can install LED batons which last longer).
Get the “daylight” or “cool daylight” LED. This has a color temperature of 6000-6500 Kelvin, which is better than Northern light in the temperate zone which has a bluish cast (10000 K). As for ability to see colors, most new LED have a CRI of about 85, which is less than tungsten/halogen but also will not burn the house down. Good quality (expensive, difficult to obtain) fluorescent bulbs may have a CRI > 90. However, fluorescent bulbs will rapidly diminish in brightness depending on how many times they are switched on and off.
High CRI LED (CRI > 95) is usually around 90 lumens/watt. In normal use, I have not found this 10 CRI difference to be a problem (it is hardly noticeable). Brightness (to judge values correctly) is far more important than color accuracy.
Well said
For lighting fixture
Two simple anglepoise desk lamps that bolt on to your table
They are very inexpensive and easily availablePlace them at the top of the table at either end then aim them at 45 degrees to the table
This eliminates and back reflection or glare from the bulb and the two gives a very even lightI use white spiral fluorescent 20W bulbs, which gives me very goo light when working at night
I leave them on when I am working in daylight to get the same color from the paperRemember, light is inversely proportional to the distance
So two smaller desk mounted lamps will give you much much more light than a very large ceiling lampFebruary 13, 2019 at 3:03 pm #779017Thank all of you for your replies. I’ve been looking locally and online for a good desk lamp or two that will get the job done.
I just wanted to say Thanks! -
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