High-key lighting is usually quite homogeneous and free from dark shadows.

The advantage to high-key lighting is that it doesn't require adjustment for each scene which allows the production to complete the shooting in hours instead of days.

The primary drawback is that high-key lighting fails to add meaning or drama by lighting certain parts more prominently than others.

High-key lighting is a style of lighting for film, television, or photography that aims to reduce the lighting ratio present in the scene.

High key as a term used in describing paintings or photographs is related to but not the same as high-key lighting in cinema or photography.

High-key lighting found its use in classical Hollywood cinema because it was well suited for three-point lighting and other filmmaking traditions.

Most recently, shows with bigger budgets moved away from high-key lighting by using lighting set-ups different from the standard three-point lighting.

In the 1950s and 1960s, high-key lighting was achieved through multiple light sources lighting a scene-usually using three fixtures per person (left, right, and central) -which resulted in a uniform lighting pattern with very little modeling.

Much of the celebrated film noir tradition relies on techniques Toland perfected in the early thirties that are related to chiaroscuro (though high-key lighting, stage lighting, frontal lighting, and other effects are interspersed in ways that diminish the chiaroscuro claim).

Interval's lectures and classes covered the mechanics and aesthetics of portraiture, indoor and outdoor lighting, high-key lighting, posing, facial analysis, candid photography, oil and pastel print enhancement, evaluation of competition prints, principles of studio management, marketing, and sales.

Neil Winokur Janet Borden Gallery 560 Broadway (near Prince Street) SoHo Through July 29 In this sampler show, Neil Winokur presents a wide selection of images made using his distinctive blend of high-key lighting, frontal poses and brightly colored backgrounds.