Beyond Ambient Light with Jiggie Alejandrino

By Jian Choa

Late last year, a survey held by Zone V Camera Club revealed “lighting” to be the most requested topic for additional learning. The members certainly weren’t left hanging as the Z Academy team decided to hold its 4^th session this year as the first face-to-face workshop, specifically on lighting techniques. We were all elated to find out that the speaker is none other than Mr. Jiggie Alejandrino – renowned portrait and wedding photographer, well recognized for his masterful and creative use of light.

Jiggie has also given a Zoom seminar for the club last February 2021, showcasing his lighting techniques from his home studio in the middle of the pandemic. (Check out his Youtube channel if you haven’t!)

With this live workshop, the members now get a rare chance to learn and apply his teachings in person.

So came the day of the workshop: It was an early Friday morning as I headed off to Raw Honey Lab studio, pleasantly nestled away in a hidden house along a quiet street in Sta. Ana, Manila. Going up the stairs and into the entrance, I was greeted by a huge tiled black accent wall, and enclosing this room were large white window panes (this particular area was aptly nicknamed “The Glass Box”).

Moving further inside, there is an array of archaic steel windows with frosted glass lining the entire studio unit, providing a crazy amount of natural light. A lot of interesting items filled the room: plants, vases, chairs, tables, lamps, books, vintage cameras, vinyls … even a bath tub and macramé swing found their way into this quaint 100 sqm+ space. Raw Honey Lab was created and designed by the talented Kitty Bunag, also a professional photographer and fellow Sony ambassador.

All this definitely set the perfect playground for what Jiggie had in store for us!

Photos above from Raw Honey Lab’s Instagram Account

The lecture:

Jiggie then started the lecture, quickly moving through his slides and stressing that majority of our time will be spent shooting. I mentally took down notes amidst the flurry of terms and occasional trick questions he threw at us. He was steadfast not to overload us with technical information and gave very unique insights, some of which I’m happy to share below:

Ambient light – everything already available in the scene

Artificial light – everything you add to the scene

Contrast – combination of shadows, true tone, and highlights. This is what gives the image depth and pop.

He remarked that using flash/continuous light is not about removing all the shadows, but to use it to enhance the image. Contrast is actually what gives photos that 3D effect. Oh and as a bonus, shadows will always slim down your subjects!

I know that as amateur photographers, we would usually wait for golden hour or get into the shade when shooting. It’s amazing how Jiggie actually prefers to shoot midday. He asserted that highlights and shadows are actually our friends, and to always be a problem solver and not a complainer!

Always look for the nice ambient light despite any weather. Artificial light really is just about how to better emulate what we see with the naked eye, which has a lot more dynamic range than our cameras.

The artificial light should also have these 3 things:

• Same quality as the ambient light
• Same color as the ambient light
• Should come from the same general direction of the ambient light

Following these will give your photos a very natural look. Jiggie’s best photos often leave the viewer wondering where the artificial light was fired, or if any was used!

The shoot:

The lecture ended there and Jiggie excitedly said: “Ok guys let’s shoot!”

Sony PH happened to be a supporter of this event and we were led to a table full of Sony A7R series bodies and lenses to try out. I took a deep breath as we reformatted our memory cards and got ready for the Sony mirrorless experience. To help with the shoot, Jiggie mirrored his camera’s viewfinder to a big screen TV. Now we could see his shooting process in real time.

Before we could even think of pressing the shutter button, Jiggie taught us how to set up the shoot first. He now introduced and welcomed our lovely model Jasmine.

He said that before anything else, we should first identify where the subject’s profile (beauty side) is, which we can usually find out if we ask the model. If he/she is unaware of their profile, we may ask them to turn their head left to right, and then identify the masculine/feminine side. To Jasmine’s surprise, Jiggie quickly identified hers, and we used this newfound info to find the best ambient light location for her.

The soft diffused window light flattered Jasmine’s face well. However, we were immediately corrected by Jiggie as he shot her profile in the short (shadow) side, away from the window. This immediately added depth and enhanced her facial features.

Then it was time to set up the scene for our composition. This turned into an impromptu test of haphazardly finding which objects fit the scene, moving and removing stuff to make sure there are ZERO distracting elements.

We were already quite happy shooting when Jiggie quickly followed with “But is ambient light good enough?”

This is his favorite trick question and the (secret) answer is “How can we make it great?” He decided to fire a flash into the nearby plants to create even more shadows in the background, making the scene more mysterious and forest-like.

We continued trying out a variety of scenes and lighting, but taking care to always prioritize the ambient light. We want to work with the light, not against it. I remember the one scene that amazed me the most. It was just a simple window shot, but Jiggie decided to put a flash right by the window. He directed it at Jasmine’s face while slightly underexposing the ambient light. This gave an immediate warm glow to the subject, and was so unlike the soft lighting that I was so used to working with.

I deem it best to end this article with something Jiggie affirmed to us at the very start: “No one has the right to tell you that your photograph is ugly, the only person who can say that is you.” This is because our photographs are a representation of who we are. However, we also have to “be our own harshest critic”.

With the lessons we’ve learned, we will keep striving to improve our photos as we go beyond ambient light, beyond ourselves and our current capabilities. A big thank you to Mr. Jiggie Alejandrino, Zone V Camera Club, Z Academy, Raw Honey Lab, and Sony Philippines for this highly enlightening experience!