Family Photo Lighting

[Chris71]

I will be shooting multiple family shoots tomorrow, and was wondering about the lighting. Families will range from 2-8 members.

I will be using two shoot through umbrellas, and I am not sure where the best placement would be for them.

Do I worry about getting the correct shadows on all of the faces? Like side lighting with the nose shadows following the cheek line, or do I just go for flat even lighting on all of the faces?

Do I use a 2:1 ratio for the lighting?

I was thinking about just placing the two lights at 45 deg. angles on each side of the camera at the same power.

How high, and far away should the lights be?

Thanks in advance for any help.

[airfrogusmc]

Chris if its only 2-8 people I would go with a one stop dif between main and fill with fill over camera. I take it you're in the studio? That way threes some direction to the light. If it were a large group I would go with the two lights even power and symmetrical in placement to the group.

[Chris71]

airfrogusmc, thanks for the reply.
Yes, I will be in a studio.
So should I put the main at a 45 to camera right a little higher than head height? Then the fill behind and above camera, with a one stop difference?