The Practice, one of America's most watched and admired television series, is widely acclaimed for the quality of its production, and in particular for the richness of its pictures. Director of Photography Dennis Smith takes great care to keep that trademark depth and darkness in the pictures. "I treat it not as an hour of television, but rather that every episode is a little movie," explains Smith. "I try not to over light. I keep it simple and allow there to be shadows: to feel the outside light. Having some darkness is the fun part. For me it's all about the drama, and I'm always going for the dramatic look."

No stranger to television, Smith started out as a news and documentary cameraman, before moving on to become a camera operator in feature films, including Only the Lonely and both Home Alone films. He returned to television as a Director of Photography, where Picket Fences, his series prior to The Practice, was also one of America's most watched programs. Today Dennis Smith also steps out from behind the camera, to direct three or four episodes each season.

For Smith, one of the biggest problems is getting the light soft and flattering enough on the actors' faces, yet still keeping light off the walls of the set. "As cooperative as our production designer is in giving me good textured walls and darker colors, there's still always the problem of lighting a lot of people in a room when they're walking around, hitting different marks, and still keeping light off the walls." He is primarily concerned with where the eye is drawn in his pictures. "If you make the background drop off, it makes your actor stand out a little more, like films in the 30's and 40's. Then you knew exactly where your eye was supposed to go, as soon as you looked at a frame of the film."

Smith is a big fan of sheen. "I like sheen on things more than I like to light them. I like reflections, and things that are sort of imperfect: like life. Real light doesn't come in a perfect pattern, there's always kick, sheens and little mistakes. I try to keep those little mistakes and imperfections in what I do, and I think that makes it more real."

The development of the Soft Egg Crate® is important to Smith's photographic style, allowing him to use bigger and softer sources, while easily maintaining control over spill light. "You're dealing with one four and a half inch deep unit, and yet you have a big light source. That's a lot of control when you don't have to up put toppers, bottomers, siders, and nets. You would have to put net about six to eight feet out, before you could start to get any effective cutting from it. Now I can work without needing six more stands and flags to cut the light off the wall, and that's important for me, because I like to move the camera about a lot."

Smith has been regularly using 8ft x 8ft, 6ft x 6ft and 4ft x 4ft Soft Egg Crates®, and recently ordered a pair of custom 5ft x 8ft, twenty degree units. He explains why he chose this size: "The eight foot width gives me about the most wrap I can fit into a set, yet I can stand it on end when I need the light to carry over, and a little deeper, into the set." He is also fond of the fabric that the Soft Egg Crates® are constructed from. "If the grid is too flat or too dull it has a tendency to keep the light more concentrated and a little crisper. The slight sheen on the Lighttools® material makes the light a little softer, but still keeps it contained within the (Soft) Egg Crate® pattern."

Unsurprisingly in a television series about a legal practice, Smith is required to deal with a lot of courtroom scenes. "There are always three, four or sometimes five people sitting at a table. I don't like to use a lot of front light, so I always keep it as half-light, backlight or modified half-light at the most. It's a problem getting a big enough, soft enough source where you don't have a big fall off between the actor sitting closest to the light and the actor sitting furthest away from it. The twenty-degree Soft Egg Crate® allows me to have the light close to the actor who is nearest to the light source, but because of the grid, they are actually getting less exposure to the white surface of the light source. It makes such a huge difference being able to get that big soft light across six people without much falloff on the people on the far end. Otherwise you would have to net the light off the people closest to the light. But to get the nets in place you have to back the light up, which makes it harder again. This of course would defeat the purpose of having a large soft source."

Smith is constantly finding new applications for his Soft Egg Crates®. "In a recent episode, I had people walking around in a small jail cell. I wanted to use a really soft cross-light, but as soon as you get a soft cross-light in a small cell, the light goes all over the wall and just illuminates the room, no matter how much negative fill or black Duvetyn you put on the walls around you. I used a twenty-degree 6ft x 6ft (Soft) Egg Crate® right outside the bars. It gave me this huge soft light that was about six feet from the actor. It wrapped right around nicely into the other eye, but kept the light off the back wall: "just what I wanted to do to make the actor stand out."

In another episode, Smith was dealing with a School Board room with fifteen people sitting at a table. "I wanted to make it interesting and avoid having it look over lit like a television show. I decided to go with a high three-quarter back top-light, and wanted a source big enough that I could use to cover the whole table from any angle, but always keep the light back. I suspended a twenty-degree 8ft x 8ft (Soft) Egg Crate®, and used that like a big fluorescent bank, except that it didn't light the walls. That kept the scene beautifully rich and moody."

The Practice requires the production of 22 episodes each season, in a relentless nine months of shooting. Dennis Smith believes that by using Soft Egg Crates® he is able to work with simpler setups which result in both a shorter working day for the cast and crew, and the opportunity to paint his pictures in finer detail: "In television you do have to make some compromises, but my goal is to make as few compromises as possible. These tools help me to compromise less."