Yakov Khalip is considered one of the greatest Soviet photojournalists, a direct heir to the Russian avant-garde in photography Alexander Rodchenko. Khalip was born in 1908 in St. Petersburg in a family of intellectuals. From an early age Yakov was engaged in photography and already at the age of 20 took part in the exhibition "10 Years of Soviet Photography" and received a diploma for a series of portraits of actors. His pictures constantly appear on the pages of magazines "Film and Life" and "Soviet Photo". Recognition came to Khalip in the 1930s. In 1930, he became a photographer for the largest illustrated magazine "USSR at the construction" and later was rightfully considered one of the leading photo reporters of the magazine. In 1935, Yakov Khalip, together with Alexander Rodchenko, works on an album dedicated to the 20th anniversary of the Red Army and Navy. With the advent of the war, the work of the magazine's editorial staff is suspended, although at that time Khalip is the editor of the magazine.

In 1941, Yakov Khalip became a war photographer and joined the editorial staff of Krasnaya Zvezda newspaper and Sovinformburo. He photographed military events on nine fronts of the Great Patriotic War - in besieged Odessa, Sevastopol, Murmansk, Vyazma, Vilnius. Khalip was awarded the Order of "The Badge of Honor" (the first awarded journalist), the Order of Patriotic War II degree, the Order of Friendship of Peoples, the medal "For the Defense of Odessa", the medal "For the Defense of the Caucasus" and the medal "For Victory over Germany in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945".

After the war, Khalip, like many photographers during the struggle against "cosmopolitanism," had difficulty finding a job. He freelanced for "Ogonyok", "Smena" magazine, and took on any kind of work, up to shooting view postcards. After Stalin's death (1954), Khalip came to the magazine "Soviet Union", which was the successor of the legendary "USSR at the construction". In this magazine the photographer worked until the end of his life.

Yakov Khalip died in 1980 in Moscow and is buried in the Donskoye cemetery (New Territory of the Donskiy Monastery).