Fill Light

What a fill light is for

A single light in front of you lights one side of your face more than the other. A fill light sits on the darker side, dimmer than the main light, and lifts the shadow just enough to look natural. It is not meant to be the brightest thing in the room: if it matches your key light, you end up looking flat.

1. 1

   Set up your main light first, in front of you and slightly to one side.

2. 2

   Put this screen on the dark side, roughly opposite it, and go full screen.

3. 3

   Start at a low level — 40% or 20% — and raise it only until the shadow stops looking heavy.

4. 4

   Match the warmth to the main light, or the two sides of your face will be different colors.

Why the edges fade

A screen showing a solid rectangle of light puts a rectangle into every reflective surface nearby, including glasses, a glossy monitor and your own eyes. Fading the edges toward the frame keeps the useful light and softens that shape, which is the same reason photographers put diffusion around a light rather than pointing a bare panel at someone.

If you want the hard-edged version instead, that is the Zoom Lighting tool, which fills the panel right to the frame. If you want the light to have a shape with a hole in the middle for a camera, use the Ring Light.

What it cannot do

It cannot make your display brighter than its own brightness control allows: the level steps here dim the picture rather than the backlight. It cannot fix a window behind you, which is the most common reason a face is dark on camera in the first place. And it is a light, not a camera setting — check what the camera is actually sending with your call software's preview or the Webcam Test.