Cenci Goepel and Jens Warnecke

Cenci Goepel and Jens Warnecke

"Lightmark," the body of work by the German artists Cenci Goepel and Jens Warnecke, was created by photographing moving light sources at night. The resultant ethereal images inhabit a dramatic and often eerie landscape. Long exposures , up to an hour in length, are required to allow torchlight to take form and for the very low level of ambient light, usually from the moon, to illuminate the scenery. Seen through the viewfinder, the landscape often appears as solidly black. Using a digital medium format camera for their photography, Goepel and Warnecke focus on photographic techniques rather than post processing to achieve the results they are aiming for.
The couple travels across the world to find hidden landscapes that are yet to be captured and portrayed as a light painting.

Tips andTricks

All that shines Light painting has experienced a massive boom in the last couple decades largely due to digital photography, which allows photographers to see instantly what they have just photographed. It's an excellent tool for experimentation. To paint with light, all you really need is something that shines and can be moved. Classic objects are LED flashlights or light bulbs, but the imagination certainly knows no limits. People juggle with Star Wars light sabers, develop their own pyrotechnics and program blinking LED arrays in order to make complex designs using extended exposure to capture constant motion. Others throw fluorescent boomerangs, send boats carrying candles over water, or tag tiny lights on herds of sheep. Do you have some ideas of your own? Just try it!

Why isn't the light painter visible in the photographs? 
The most frequently asked question about our photos is why the person behind the painting isn't visible. We need not review the fundamental concept behind extended exposure in order to answer this question. For the most part, it's really simple to avoid leaving unwanted traces in your photo. First of all, we dress in all black for photographing and cover up any reflective object that might create light tracers, making black electrical tape part of every get up.
In order to darken our hands and face we wear black gloves and a black motorcycle mask. But when wearing this outfit, you have to be absolutely aware that encounters with other people or the police can easily lead to uncomfortable misunderstandings. However, even in black clothes, it's possible that the light painter will show up as a shadow in the foreground of the photo. The only things that help avoid this are quick movements and leaving the scene while exposing the background.

There are a few core rules that help our photography:
Know your equipment and what it can do for you, especially your lamps
Wear black, move fast when you're in the frame and avoid shining light on yourself
Find good sources of ambient light and use them to add depth to your shot
Don't be so engrossed with your ingenious light painting that you forget to consider the overall composition of your photograph
Collaboration helps to achieve better resultsKeep your ISO low to avoid noise.

info from lightmark

	http://www.lightmark.de/