Family Reunion Shoot

[somesimplegirl]

I took pictures as different families came in to our Family Reunion to sort of commemorate the last few remaining members. A lot of the pictures I know are too bright, some aren't bright enough, and some people just asked for too many people to fit on my 6*9 backdrop (I had a group of 13 at one point!) But this one is the simplest, and this is what I had planned on doing. I have 3 regular white lights - two with umbrellas. I had them placed on either corner of the backdrop. I see that it made the little one in the middle look very washed out (she is naturally pale, with bright blonde hair in the first place) and that there was a shadow cast on the mother's face. I only had the two lights on in the corners. I wasn't using the third. How do I fix the backdrop? You can clearly see where it is folded in the photo ): Any words of advice? And how should I edit these to make them less harsh? Thanks!
Edit: I also wanted to add a few more questions? Where should I place the lights? How close should I have my camera? How close should I have the lights? Should they be higher or lower than the subject? Is it better to shoot in auto-no flash or auto with flash? Or portrait? Sorry about all of the questions!



Canon Rebel XS
Auto Mode
No Flash Fired

[zona5101]

I don't see any image with your post...

[somesimplegirl]

It's there on my screen ):
the URL for it is http://i51.tinypic.com/jztcty.jpg

[zona5101]

Originally Posted by somesimplegirl

It's there on my screen ):
the URL for it is http://i51.tinypic.com/jztcty.jpg

sometimes browsers act weird
double mad casue i can't open the link.

i am sure someone else will mosey along and help you out... good luck.

[somesimplegirl]

what in the world. I am sorry! ): I'm not sure how to fix that!

[Doug Sundseth]

Backdrop: You can fix it in post with a context-sensitive fill, a healing patch, or a clone (among other techniques). If you mean "How can I prevent this in camera?", you need to get less light on the background relative to the light on the subjects. This could be done by flagging your lights, by using modifiers that are more directional than umbrellas, or by moving your subjects farther from the background so that inverse-square falloff works for you.

Shadows: You need to place your subjects and lights so they aren't lined up. This could be done by moving the center subject forward, back, or down, or by moving your lights up (so the shadow goes down) or toward the camera (so the shadow falls between the back subjects. Managing shadows in group shots is critical and depends on the specific geometry involved.

Light distance: Closer is softer, but you get more falloff between subjects. Farther is harder with less falloff. For any given modifier, you don't get to have both.

Light position: Many, many choices. For two lights, 45 degrees left and right is very common and works pretty well for flat lighting. (To give the light a bit more shape, you can increase the power of one light or change the distances). Placing your key lighting low works for Halloween, but for about 364 days a year, it's not the place I'd look first. If your key light is high, though, a low fill light can work very well.

Auto mode is a major part of your problem here. Since the background and clothing of the subjects are both black, the camera is overexposing the subjects skin in an attempt to get a good average luminance. When you're shooting with lights, set your aperture, shutter speed, ISO, and white balance manually to correctly expose the important parts of your subjects. Once you have that, you should be pretty good for the rest of the shoot. The last thing you want is exposure changing because the next group is wearing white clothing, and the white balance changing because the third group is wearing electric blue.

If you shot in RAW, you can probably pull the exposure down pretty effectively in post. If you shot in JPG, it will be more difficult and you're more likely to have artifacts, but you should still be able to get a decent result.

HTH

[ccting]

Shape composition: The eyes form triangle, the greatest shape that photographers might want.

DOF Plane: Ensure that your camera is 90 degree to the plane of that triangle plane form by eyes. Using F5.6, i think for group of 3 is sufficient. In this case, i think you better shot higher than the normal perspective (i.e. above the eyes).

Posting: rule of third?
Body, hair and arm lines: Becareful with position of body and arms, they form lines.

Neck: just skip them? Shot higher or ask them tint down

Tone: Are you trying to shoot low-key portrait? I not sure low-key portrait is suitable for group... the color and tone of clothes and background are all same. ...

Focus: I don't know how easy to focus sharply on their both eyes, since the triangle plane can't easily form because of different DOF of both eyes .. Perhaps increase F5.6 to F8 or F11.. lol

White balance: Play with multiple white balance card to alter the color? if you plan to use flash, it is better for you to understand the guide number of the flash you got, then do some mathematically calculation that involve ISO, F-number, distance. DOn't fire too often and it is quite ignoring.

For me, to get as many ppl to fix in a fix len, i shoot from top or bottom, that more creative way to shoot with distortion.

Perhaps, you should take 1 person first, then 2, then 3... then more.. one by one.. and see the result. Just remember the distance of all eyes to the camera lens should be almost the same. If two lines of ppl, then shoot higher.

Well, i am just a learner, ignore if i am disturbing.