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“Romanticism was characterized by its emphasis on emotion and individualism as well as glorification of all the past and nature”. – Wikipedia

Examples from Ivan Aivazovsky and Albert Bierstadt:

Romanticism is my favorite art movement because it breaks so many rules of reality to create the best possible version of a scene. This is the essence of cinematic lighting so many years later.

When thinking about what films to focus this study on, the first answer I could think of was immediately The Hobbit. However, I could not immediately point out the specifics of why I thought it relates to Romanticism, but was eager to find out.

So, what concepts make a romantic scene and how do films use these concepts to feel like a Romantic period painting? The following study will use examples from The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and Moana, among others, and painted works mainly from Albert Bierstadt and Ivan Aivazovsky.

Since nature was a common subject in Romantic paintings, the following concepts will focus on landscapes.

SPOTLIGHTING


The first concept is spotlighting. A general rule for landscapes is to spotlight by utilizing shadows of land features or clouds. This can be done subtly, but in Romanticism, this technique is pushed to the extreme by using a wide value range and isolating small areas of the landscape.

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The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, Moana, examples:

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Lighting Direction

It’s nice to know how spotlighting was used, but in which direction do you place the spotlight? Landscapes are  lit to maintain atmospheric depth: back and side lighting to keep foregrounds dark and let atmosphere brighten up the background. More on that in my previous post:

https://parispremdasblog.wordpress.com/2017/07/29/dark-foregrounds-a-rule-cinematic-lighting/

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Majority of landscapes in The Lord of the Rings and Hobbit trilogies are backlit, and this is a followed rule by most DP’s because it gives the best contour modeling to the landscape with a balance of light and dark.

Backlighting:

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Or side lighting

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There are exceptions. What about frontal lighting? Can’t that be pleasing for a landscape? Of course. Near frontal lighting for a large landscape is pleasing if it’s balanced out with shadow so the image isn’t washed out. Albert Bierstadt shows us how:

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Moana examples:

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And a Hobbit example of this concept:

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