Ash Ellis Teaches Lighting

Ash Ellis at Escape Studios

Our Animation and 3D Studio Assistant, Ash Ellis, took over the Animation Short Course for one day last week to teach our animation students the fundamentals of lighting in animation.

​Animators don't need a high level of expertise in lighting, as they are generally judged by recruiters and studios purely on their animation skills.

Nonetheless, a basic understanding of lighting setups is an important ancillary skill, part of the animator's toolkit.

At last year's VIEW conference, Pixar lighting expert Kim White revealed some of the secrets of Pixar lighting setups on Cars 3.  As you'd expect from Pixar, it wasn't so much a technical lecture as a description of how the lighting department used lighting techniques to support the storytelling.

Lighting can affect how an audience responds to a shot in so many ways, using (for example) a warm or cold colour palette.  So a discussion of lighting inevitably involves core film-making skills such as colour theory and colour design, composition, and art direction.

Many thanks to Ash for an excellent workshop on the basic principles of lighting in animation.

The Escape Studios Animation Blog offers a personal view on the art of animation and visual effects. To apply for our new BA/MArt starting in September 2018, follow this link. We train all our students with practical real-world skills, to give them the best possible chance of a career in industry. To see some of our animation success stories, follow this link.