This technique of photography is used to create a dramatic, and sometimes artistic, pictures of a scene or subject. In portrait photography, it is commonly called as "low key portraiture".
In this kind of photo, the shadow and bright areas are contrasty, dark and bright stand side by side, and most of them were created without color (black & white photo) to further emphasise the shape of objects.
Modellers probably seldom use this technique, unless if they have some knowledge in photography, and really know what he/she want to achieve. It is not that easy with yesterday's film camera, but today's digital camera works wonder; its ability to give instant preview makes the job much easier. You do not need an accurate spot-metering anymore, even with a compact point-n-shoot camera, you can still create a nice high contrast photo of your model, with just a bit of patience.

This chapter will be presented in 3 pages:

Page 1 - The Lighting
Page 2 - Setting the Exposure
Page 3 - Selecting the Subjects

The Lighting

Unlike common macrophotography where the lighting is as even as possible without any shadow, the "low key" photo needs a single directional light source. Only one flood light or spot light without any diffuser or reflector. Light direction is angled against the camera, from 45 degree to 90 degree. Never use a frontal lighting ( light is coming from the same direction as the camera), or back lighting ( light is coming toward the camera).

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