18 Beautiful Bright High Key Photographs

If you find yourself squinting at high key photographs, you may not be alone! High key photographs are bright and airy but they also have an upbeat, incredibly clean or cold feel to them. It’s an advanced photography technique which involves either expensive studio lighting or amazing control over bright natural light.

This week I looked at dozens of amazing high key photographs and learned more about creating them. I even attempted my own high key photographs for the very first time! I selected 18 of my favorites below to share with and inspire you!

All the photos chosen for this gallery are licensed through Creative Commons at the time of this blog post. I love and support Creative Commons and want to thank those who are generous with their gorgeous work by helping to promote it.

If you like any of the photos you see in this article, please make sure to click through, favorite, leave a comment, or place in your own galleries! I bet you will help make the artists’ day a little brighter!

I’d also like to encourage you to create your own 18 photograph High Key gallery on Flickr and then share the link either in the comments here or the High Key discussion thread on Flickr! It’s a great photographic exercise!

Warning: While I wouldn’t have a problem letting my sons (ages 2 and 3.5) view any of the photographs in this blog post at any age, some feel otherwise about the naked human form. Nothing distasteful or full frontal lies ahead, but I don’t want to offend some people or their employers. Proceed with caution.

Put on Your Sunglasses for High Key Glee!

1.) Photo Credit: Luca Rossato

2.) Photo Credit: Christopher Holland | Exordium

3.) Photo Credit: doris hausen | herbstkind.com

4.) Photo Credit: Kristaps B | @KristapsB

5.) Photo Credit: stefanos

6.) Photo Credit: Mikhail Checkmezov | blog.photo-park.ru

7.) Photo Credit: Mike Lawson

8.) Photo Credit: Jacob Haslehurst | jacobhaslehurst.com

9.) Photo Credit: Jonathan Cohen | aardvark.ucsd.edu

10.) Photo Credit: Matt Reinbold

11.) Photo Credit: Chris JL

12.) Photo Credit: Luis Argerich | The Amazing Light | @lrargerich

13.) Photo Credit: d u .r. M a c i e l | durmaciel.com | @eduardormaciel

14.) Photo Credit: Jo Christian Oterhals | oter.net

15.) Photo Credit: Kenneth Moyle | kenneth.moyle.ca

16.) Photo Credit: Tim Samoff | samoff.com

17.) Photo Credit: Massimo Regonati

18.) Photo Credit: Ana | AventArte

Even More High Key Goodness!

Make sure to view everyone’s submissions for this week’s high key theme! You can browse through them all by clicking a thumbnail below. A lightbox will appear and you can navigate left or right.

Next Week’s Theme is Square Format!

I just couldn’t help myself! I love square format and I’m obsessed with it lately. It’s more than just a square crop and I want to see how YOU use it! Please feel free to submit up to five square photographs to the Friday Finds group this week and tag them dwcff-square! Also be sure to subscribe to my newsletter to get tips and links to complete this assignment plus more inspiration!