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Low-key lighting is one of the most important elements in photography especially when creating a chiaroscuro effects. Often in photography many different lights are used to create effect, but in Low-key lighting only one is used. Sometimes this light can be controlled with reflectors and other photography tools. The Low-key lighting is used to allow certain parts of the model to come through in the image and not necessarily the whole person.

 

Chiaroscuro is the effect created in an image to show a high difference and contrast, for example between the image and the background. Low-key lighting uses the effect of Chiaroscuro to bring forward the model or object in a photograph. Artists and historians used the technical term Chiaroscuro to describe the use of contrast, in light to achieve a sense of volume in modelling three-dimensional objects and figures.