Lighting

Lighting conventions:


The character  Nick Dunne from Gone Girl

Low key lighting is mainly used to depict a sense of suspense and uncertainty as well as adding to the mise en scene to create a unsettling and disturbing atmosphere for the audience. A lot of shots used in psychological thrillers use low key lighting to only show a part of a characters face. This is used to not only put the audience members on edge as they find the characters appearance unsettling, but can also be a physical metaphor for an unpredictable or split personality. By using the lighting to create a shadowed effect the audience begin to understand that there is more to the character than it may seem, creating enigma and intriguing the audience.

The character Teddy Daniels from
Shutter Island.

Backlight is less often used in psychological thrillers, however IS very effective when used as it enhanced a character or object on screen. This causes the audience to notice the element of the shot which is being highlighted creating enigma as to its relevance. A backlight often gives a halo effect around a characters head particularly at the ends of hair. This can be used to portray different characters in different ways.


The character Amy Dunne from Gone Girl 

Fill lighting may be used to reduce the contrast of a scene to match the dynamic range of the recording media and record the same amount of detail typically seen by the eye in average lighting. This creates a blander colour scheme to shot to create a darker more suspicious atmosphere to a scene.