High Key photography
31st July 2011
High key photography is a technique, which works well with young women, children, flowers and other beautiful subjects although it can of course be used to effect in other situations. The idea is to have the image lighter than normal and not to have any deep shadows BUT do not confuse this with not having full blacks in the picture. Sometimes, perhaps most times, a full black or almost full black is needed to add weight, contrast drama and compositional balance; occasionally a high key image may consist entirely of lighter tones. This is however less common.
The key to achieving satisfactory high key image is having suitable lighting which is set up and balanced to give even light and not cast deep shadows; my first attempt at the style failed for this reason. Most articles on the subject recommend three or more lights (flash or studio can be used) but it is possible with two diffused lights, as in my example flash guns shot through diffusers etc.) or even in soft natural light such as an overcast day would give.
The base for my example is my next door neighbor; I was taking pictures of her three year old daughter and grabbed the opportunity to snatch this single exposure of her with evenly powered flash left and right softened by diffusers. It is because this is a grab shot that the basic exposure is darker than it should be. It is always best to get the exposure as near right as possible in camera and this is at least 1.5 stops underexposed. Fortunately it was not critically underexposed, there are no dark shadows nor areas which would show digital noise from increasing the brightness in post processing.
The first image below is the original RAW file without any editing.
Development of the RAW file in Adobe Lightroom consisted of adding 32 points fill light to reduce the shadows and increasing brightness and contrast to the maximum. Adding brightness rather than increasing the exposure ensured that highlight detail was not lost while the contrast helped to keep some depth in the shadows. In certain areas, particularly the hair, the shadows were dodged back while in other areas they were necessary to the tonal balance of the image. Finally a second version of the edited RAW file was exported but this time about a stop lower exposure and this was masked onto the worked edit to give more solid blacks in the area of the eye, finally the image was cropped a bit tighter. This resulted in the final version, below.
Although this is high key nowhere are the highlights blown and detail is retained throughout.
The key to achieving satisfactory high key image is having suitable lighting which is set up and balanced to give even light and not cast deep shadows; my first attempt at the style failed for this reason. Most articles on the subject recommend three or more lights (flash or studio can be used) but it is possible with two diffused lights, as in my example flash guns shot through diffusers etc.) or even in soft natural light such as an overcast day would give.
The base for my example is my next door neighbor; I was taking pictures of her three year old daughter and grabbed the opportunity to snatch this single exposure of her with evenly powered flash left and right softened by diffusers. It is because this is a grab shot that the basic exposure is darker than it should be. It is always best to get the exposure as near right as possible in camera and this is at least 1.5 stops underexposed. Fortunately it was not critically underexposed, there are no dark shadows nor areas which would show digital noise from increasing the brightness in post processing.
The first image below is the original RAW file without any editing.
Development of the RAW file in Adobe Lightroom consisted of adding 32 points fill light to reduce the shadows and increasing brightness and contrast to the maximum. Adding brightness rather than increasing the exposure ensured that highlight detail was not lost while the contrast helped to keep some depth in the shadows. In certain areas, particularly the hair, the shadows were dodged back while in other areas they were necessary to the tonal balance of the image. Finally a second version of the edited RAW file was exported but this time about a stop lower exposure and this was masked onto the worked edit to give more solid blacks in the area of the eye, finally the image was cropped a bit tighter. This resulted in the final version, below.
Although this is high key nowhere are the highlights blown and detail is retained throughout.
