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• The primary purpose of cinematic lighting is to
  support the story by contributing to the overall
  visual structure of the film.
• From Advanced Renderman

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Objectives Of Lighting

• Directing the viewers eye
• Creating Depth
• Conveying the Time of Day and setting
• Enhancing Mood, Atmosphere, and Drama
• Revealing Character Personality and Situation

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Directing The Viewers Eye

• Setting up lighting involves adding emphasis to
  the subject matter so that the viewer focuses
  directly on the intended action. By positioning
  lights in specific positions, a lighting artist
  can pull the subject out from the background and
  lead the viewers eye. Sometimes shots are on
  screen for only a short time, and it becomes
  important to emphasize the action quickly in
  order to create an effective shot.

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Creating Depth

• Lighting can be used to emphasis a sense of depth
  by giving the viewer depth cues such as shadow
  areas and light fall off. The relationship of
  the foreground and background elements and their
  lighting are used by lighting artist to create
  depth and separation.

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Conveying the Time of Day and Setting

• The location and intensity of light is used by a
  lighting artist to suggest a time of day or
  specific location. This is especially important
  for establishing the mood of a sequence.
  Depending on the type of lighting chosen,
  environments can look completely different.

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Enhancing Mood, Atmosphere, and Drama

• The style of lighting can be used to emphasis the
  the mood of a sequence. The color, position, and
  intensity of lights in a scene can be used to
  reinforce the mood of the characters on screen.

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Revealing Character Personality and Situation

• The quality, color, and light direction are used
  by lighting artists to emphasize the the
  personality or character of the subject matter of
  shot. Different lighting setups can be used on
  the same character in different situations to
  describe different aspects of that characters
  personality.

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Three-point Lighting

• Three-point lighting is a traditional approach to
  lighting that involves 3 types of lights that are
  used to light the subject of a shot. The key
  light is the primary light source, the fill light
  adds additional light, and the rim light
  separates the subject from the background.

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Light Roles

• Ambient Light
• Key Light
• Fill Light
• Rim Light
• Bounce Light

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Ambient Light

• Ambient light is the base light that is applied
  to the entire scene including shadows. They
  generally used to prevent areas of absolute black
  especially in areas that are not directly
  affected by the key light.

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Key Light

• The Key Light is the dominant source of color and
  illumination in a scene. The key light generally
  produces the strongest shadow in a shot. As the
  main light source, the key light is used to
  define the mood of a shot.

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Fill Light

• Fill Light adds subtle illumination to shadow
  areas that are not affected directly by the key
  light. The ratio of the key light plus fill
  light to the fill light by itself is referred to
  as the lighting ratio. The lighting ratio is
  directly related to the contrast level of the
  scene.

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Rim Light

• The Rim Light is used to pop a foreground
  element and separate it form the background. A
  rim light is generally aimed directly at the
  camera from behind the foreground subject matter
  creating a thin halo around the edge of the
  foreground element.

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Bounce Light

• In order to accurately portray real life lighting
  situations, bounce light can be used to simulate
  light bounced of surfaces in the environment.
  Some rendering engines can calculate bounced
  light from the key light and fill light sources
  by simulating light rays bouncing around in the
  environment.

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Lighting Continuity

• Keeping consistent lighting across can become a
  problem especially when more that one artist is
  working on a particular sequence. It is
  important to check the lighting of a shot with
  the rest of the sequence to insure consistency,
  especially with the shot directly before and
  directly after the shot. Sometimes camera angles
  can influence lighting continuity. Shots with
  the exact same lighting setup can appear to be
  lit differently depending on the camera of each
  shot.

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Color Script
Lighting Continuity
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Lights

• Ambient Light
• Directional Light
• Point Light
• Spot Light
• Area Light
• Volume Light

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Ambient Light

• An ambient light adds illumination evenly to the
  entire scene. They are generally used for subtle
  fill light or to increase the brightness of an
  entire scene including areas of shadow.

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Directional Light

• A Directional Light adds illumination from one
  direction across the entire scene. A common use
  for a directional light is to simulate outdoor
  sunlight. By the time light reaches the surface
  of the earth it is best simulated as coming from
  one constant direction especially for small
  environments.

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Spot Light

• A spot light casts light in a specific area
  defined by a cone of light emanating from a
  point. They are commonly used for character
  lighting due to the fact that they offer the
  lighting artist lots of control.

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Point Light

• A point light emits light from a specific point
  outward in all directions. They are commonly
  used to simulate light coming from an omni
  directional light source like a light bulb or
  candle.