Late fall early winter family portrait

[BLINN]

I am looking for some idea or photos for ideas to shoot a family portrait in the outdoors this time of year. Any help would be great. Thanks Mike

[biznitch15]

Try by an outside christmas tree the day after it snows. Good luck.

[Sean-Mcr]

The old classic (and it's a classic for a reason) is a floor full of golden fall leafs.

This guy over on Fred Miranda has taken a great portrait, a bit of a cliche, but cliches are cliches for a reason

http://www.fredmiranda.com/hosting/showphoto.php?photo=27600&sort=1&size=medium&cat=500

[MTalley]

The FM example is great for a single subject. Might be a little cliche, but I really like how it came out for that particular subject. This is one pose that obviously would not work as well for guys as for gals. I can see a parent ordering a bunch of prints of this for a senior portrait package.

That is the right direction, though. Given your location, I would assume that all trees that drop their leaves have already done so (I live fairly far south, so we are just starting to rake those buggers up down here). Bleak looking, empty tree branches against a gray winter sky obviously don't make an ideal backdrop, so you'll want to stay up a little higher and keep the ground as your backdrop. As mentioned previously, a nice colorful bed of leaves work well.

Snow is great, too (I sometimes wish it snowed here occasionally, at least more than once every five years as a freak occurrence). Depending on the expectation of the customer as far as the type of image desired, work the prevailing temperature into your plans. If they all want to sit around in somewhat casual clothing that consists of nothing heavier than a bulky sweater (such as the FM example cited above), you don't want to be out shooting in -10C weather.