In order to rim light a subject, you need to position your light source somewhere behind your subject. As you vary the angle, you vary what gets highlighted . If you place it directly behind your subject, you should end up with even coverage throughout. The example below shows a rim light almost perpendicular to the couple, which creates a white highlight that wraps the contour of their bodies.

With the snowboarding helmet example, two rim lights were placed at a 45 degree angle, creating a slight wrap around of the light. This is apparent by the soft reflections on the left and right side of the helmet. In this photo, the rim lights are acting as the primary light sources, which allows for the subject’s face to be concealed using a shadow.

So when should you use rim lighting?

There are many uses, but the two key ones are:

• Shaping. A rim light will accentuate an object’s shape by highlighting it.
• Concealing. You can also use a rim light to draw attention away from certain parts of your subject/product.

Rim lighting isn’t needed all the time, but it is a quick tool you can use to really help a photo pop. While a bit more complicated, you can also use the sun as a rim light, but you have to be careful about your backgrounds and extreme back-lighting.

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There are two quick ways to combat this. The first is by adding some light to your backdrop. In the photo on the left, I pointed secondary light towards the backdrop. In the photo on the right, I added a hair light, which also acts as a rim light. This time, the secondary light is placed behind the subject, pointing towards the camera. This is my preferred method because it is more common in the corporate world, and I like the way a hair light looks.

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They key component in photographing additional products is having them look identical to those shot months earlier. When breaking down my lighting for a different project, I find it helpful to document the setup for future shoots. There are several photo and web applications designed for this purpose, but in my opinion, they take too much time. The best method I’ve found, is to take a picture, and spend 3 minutes overlaying it with exposure variables, like above.

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