Marc 182 wrote in message et...
In article ,
says...
James Meckley wrote in message ...
zeitgeist wrote:


Almost all Renaissance and later portraiture uses light coming from
the subject's right (viewer's left).


This is simply not true. A broad survey of western painting shows only
a slight bias toward portraits lit from the left (about a 55/45 split),
with some painters favoring left, some right and some exhibiting no
preference.


In the early days before people read as much as we do these days, heck,
before it was common for people to read, it didn't matter which side you
placed the light. Today, since most all readers have a natural tendency to
enter an image from the left side (this has been shown in studies were they
use a laser to map where the eye is directed as it moves across a page.

painters and early photographers used northlight studios and I would imagine
the side it was placed depended on the shape of the room.

Even more interesting is photographic portraiture, which shows a
virtually even 50/50 distribution of left-right preference in a survey
of fine art and commercial portraiture over the last 100 years. The
only exceptions are certain amateurs and camera-club members who are
unduly influenced by dogmatic rules telling them that the light must
come from the left.


use of right light in a commercial image is often a deliberate rule break to
cause the eye to stop, commercial imagery often uses deliberately bad
composition to cause the viewer to stop and mentally try and balance the
composition, usually implanting the item in your brain.

the use of a strong or contrasty right light can slow the eye down like a
speed bump.


My point in making the above comments was that this "rule" has been
broken so many times (fully half the time in photographic portraiture
and 40% of the time in painting) that it can no longer be considered a
rule, if it ever was. Of course, I admit to being skeptical of
aesthetic rules, anyway.

The most-often-proposed explanation for this "rule", the fact that we
read from left to right and therefore our eyes enter an image from the
left, has never been very convincing to me. I don't disagree with the
perceptual principle involved; I just have no difficulty entering a
darkened image that gradually becomes lighter and more revealing as I
scan it. Rather like a fade-in in film.

James Meckley



How do you account for my extreme discomfort looking at images where
the light comes from my right side?

Why do you assume your "extreme discomfort" is indicative of anyone
else?

I seem to recall talking to a portrait photographer, many years ago,
and I remember him turning puple at the sight of light from the right.
When? I cannot remember. Maybe it was one of the Makio yearbook
portrait photographers. The yearbook would have a photographer
available for senior portraits for about 3 weeks in the fall and
winter quarters. We would reserve a suite in the Ohio Union, and
advertise in the school rag, and announce at football games. Needless
to say, even so some students never got the word. One mother wrote to
me when I became editor and asked why her son's picture wasn't in the
Makio. I told her that this wasn't high school, and that students were
'on their own', that no-one is going door-to-door looking for seniors,
and ushering them in to getting their picture taken for the yearbook.
We didn't have the time.