First Family Shoot

So the other day I had my first family photoshoot, I've never been comfortable being around people much less take their photos , but its something I've been working on this year. This is one of the photos from the photoshoot taken with my Nikon D3200.

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Get em out of that harsh sun.

texkam wrote in post #18381001
Get em out of that harsh sun.

Absolutely. And a better background that they are further away from. I'd suggest a wider aperture as well... less DOF.

Welcome the the forum.

Welcome to the forums!

Newbies first task - bring down the saturation. Also that what others said

Thanks guys, I admit the location wasn't ideal but it's where the Mom wanted them done, although I could have possibly suggested somewhere else right? What aperture should I have used? As for the harsh sun I again wanted to do the photos sometime after 7 but the Mom wanted to do them around 6 so *Shrugs*

With experience, you'll learn to gently manage and direct clients. After shooting the requested location you find a way to suggest ..... "Hey, let's say we now try moving over here for a few shots." Gently and confidently take charge and get the better shot.

..... "Wow, I like what you did so much better."

texkam wrote in post #18381330
With experience, you'll learn to gently manage and direct clients. After shooting the requested location you find a way to suggest ..... "Hey, let's say we now try moving over here for a few shots." Gently and confidently take charge and get the better shot.

..... "Wow, I like what you did so much better."

This.

Been in similar situations, still get in those situations, where they want what they want. You do it real quick, it's what they want, then you draw their attention to something else and get the good stuff. Win-win.

+++++++++++++++

As for the image:

Regardless of the background, the light is every where, hard light, shade, all in the same FOV. Very distracting. Hard shadows. Full sun blanches color.
Background has no purpose in this image. Brick wall and a rock. It doesn't add anything. The rock is just distracting if anything. It could have been used maybe, but it doesn't become part of the composition the way it is here.
Composition is everything. I suggest you pick up some material about composition for portraiture.
You have eyes and hands. That's good.
If you're not confident about what aperture to use, or why that matters, I also suggest you do a little reading on depth of field and distance to subject and subject distance to background so that you can control where focus lands and what things are in focus or out of focus. There's nothing wrong with a full depth of field portrait, but you have to pay attention to the environment and if the environment is actually a part of it in a positive way.

Very best,

Thanks for the tips, I really appreciate it. I'll read up on composition and work on that, I think though once I get use to photographing people I'll be more relaxed and not so nervous and can be more authorative until then I'll keep working on everything.

Someone else family photoshoot? You have done it great. All settings were good on exposure and maybe you used fill-in flash as well. It looks kind of semi-candid.
Three kinds to get them like this it is achievement on its own. Background is not disturbing and here is right amount of DoF for 2+1. All hands and faces are in focus.

Next time try it at 55 end and place people on greater distance from background. And 18mm, f8 and very close will do. You have to be low if not lower for shots like this with one who is in the middle. They will try to touch the lens, get ready for it with cleaning kit.

kf095 wrote in post #18381422
Someone else family photoshoot? You have done it great. All settings were good on exposure and maybe you used fill-in flash as well. It looks kind of semi-candid.
Three kinds to get them like this it is achievement on its own. Background is not disturbing and here is right amount of DoF for 2+1. All hands and faces are in focus.

Next time try it at 55 end and place people on greater distance from background. And 18mm, f8 and very close will do. You have to be low if not lower for shots like this with one who is in the middle. They will try to touch the lens, get ready for it with cleaning kit.

Thanks so much, and haha yeah I was surprised I got everything in focus as well because usually the eyes will be out of focus.

certainly a cute little girl.

I'd suggest a reshoot. Get baby at the same focal plane as the boys. Have her interact with the boys in some way (hands on heads or shoulders or put the boys together and baby on top) Open up your f-stop as wide as possible (f 2.8 maybe). Wait for a cloudy day. Tell the boys to open their eyes. Use fill flash. In this setting move the kids camera right and forward to use the out-of-focus rock as background. Your low angle is great - keep it there.

I was looking over the rest of the photos and I think them sitting on the rock/boulder turned out better, well besides me cutting off the part of the one kid's head and I should've zoomed out more to get their limbs in the photo.

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The lighting is much better on this one, though I don't like all of the hands wrapping around the toddler. It is somewhat distracting to the image.