Example of long exposure painting with light. LED torch with a camera mounted on a tripod. Citroen Picasso.

Example of long exposure painting with light. LED torch with a camera mounted on a tripod. The car used here was a Citroen Picasso. Light painting is a photographic technique in which exposures are made by moving a hand-held light source or by moving the camera. The term light painting also encompasses images lit from outside the frame with hand-held light sources. Light Painting Photography can be traced back to the year 1914 when Frank Gilbreth, along with his wife Lillian Moller Gilbreth, used small lights and the open shutter of a camera to track the motion of manufacturing and clerical workers. Man Ray, in his 1935 series "Space Writing, " was the first known art photographer to use the technique and Barbara Morgan began making light paintings in 1940.