People starting out may see creative lighting design as a daunting task, because it is essentially a non-rule-bound job, with only the necessary technical knowledge. Let's think about it. How can a novice designer be competent in stage lighting?

Lighting design should be regulated

Unlike physics, academic knowledge, budget, and time, the creative elements of light design can look like a blank space to the novice designer, who wants to find a clue to a better design, rather than simply "assemble" it. In order to work on this blank space, it is helpful to know the key parameters that provide the anchor point for the creative elements in the blank space. In short, there must be rules.

(1) what are the rules of lighting design?

The first thing to accept, perhaps, is that while there are no rules for lighting design per se, there are rules for specific lighting design. What we're talking about here is the creation rule, not the number of dimmers, or the hanging height of the rear gantry. Lighting designer, to the lighting design, know how to know how.

(2) the reason for creation? - motivation

"What is my motive?" This has become a caricature of the tragic archetype. Then again, motivation is why we create, and it's the same for lighting designers. In a theater, a club, a performance, or a concert, every element of light must have a reason for being. There are reasons for lighting elements to change or not to change.

Theater lighting design (or photographic lighting)

Create specific scenes through the presentation of space and location

Sometimes, it is easy to grasp the creative rules of lighting design. For example, in naturalistic theater lighting design (or photographic lighting), a great motivation is to create specific scenes through the presentation of space and location.

For example, this location is in France, at noon in August. The scene was in a Victorian workhouse, in the middle of the night... The rules are easy to understand, not only for lighting designers but also for performers and spectators: the midday sun is not purple and does not glow from the ground, and the midnight in a workhouse does not look like a hospital fluorescent. This kind of replication of "real" light is probably the easiest target for lighting designers to target because the world's light language is easy to analyze and known to others. This is inherent to life on earth. Naturalism is often the starting point for new theater lighting designers, and they often feel comfortable with these early design tasks.