Photographing Groups?

[lilysmom]

I'm playing the role of photographer tomorrow night for a friend's grandparents' 50th anniversary party. Her mom wants a picture of the whole family, which is pretty large. Any advice? I know to use a bounce flash but other than that? And what about posing all these people? I'm pretty nervous.

 

[RubyMagic]

I'm playing the role of photographer tomorrow night for a friend's grandparents' 50th anniversary party. Her mom wants a picture of the whole family, which is pretty large. Any advice? I know to use a bounce flash but other than that? And what about posing all these people? I'm pretty nervous.

Medium height in front, Tall in second row, shortest behind them all standing in chairs. Bounce Flash off ceiling.

Edit: Oh wait...considering there will probably be old people at this party, you wouldnt want any standing in chairs. Haha. Just have the Grandparents in front and everyone else kind of semi-eclipsed around/behind them.

 

[Big Mike]

Get outside if you can. Even when bouncing, flash will fall off over distance meaning that people farther away will be darker that those who are closer.

Also, if there is a large group, it would help if you were higher than them, so that they are looking up at you. If you are on the same level, it's much more likely that some people's faces will be blocked. If you can't set that up, then maybe put them on stairs so that the back rows are higher up.

As for posing and arranging them. Try to stagger the faces so that they are evenly spaces and so that they make a nice pattern. Try to avoid stacking one face right above another.

 

[lilysmom]

Well, in some ways it didn't go as bad as I had expected and in some ways it was worse.

Why didn't anyone tell me that every kid in the world owns their own point and shoot camera??? The kids (all 3,395,539 of them) all were in my way with their point and shoot and cell phone cameras.

I did use this as a learning experience. I did get some decent shots, but the lighting was horrible, so I came to the conclusion that I need a faster zoom lens. I used my 50mm 1.7 some of the time and got good shots, but I had to use my kit lens some of the time and it just wasn't quite fast enough.