Family Shoot (pic heavy)

Cody'sCaptures · May 28, 2018

Did a family photoshoot for a friend recently and was hoping to get some C&C on the shoot as a collection. Now that I've done this a few times and wore off the initial green-ness, it was really fun. It also didn't hurt the shoot was with a good friend and I had my Girlfriend assisting me.
I already delivered them to the "client" and they were extremely satisfied. Although that boosts my confidence it really has no bearing on the merits of the photographs. Cropping and composition is my enemy, always I find myself wading back/forth in the compare view with virtual copies. Of course that really is more of a posing, knowing my equipment, having a direction and, maintaining the atmosphere problem... I would greatly appreciate any feedback and feel free to edit and repost to this thread.

tirediron · May 28, 2018

You've got some good moments and expressions here for sure! A couple of areas for improvement: Everyone one of these needed fill light; if you look at #2, half his face is lost in deep shadow. Be careful of scenes like #4 where the slide is causing a very strong red cast to be shown on the child's skin. Some careful selection and colour adjustment will mitigate most of this. Also watch your backgrounds. Most are fine, but the 'half a house' in #6 is visually irritating (this one would have been vastly improved with some fill light). Overall though, not bad!

Cody'sCaptures · May 29, 2018

Thanks for the info John, really means a lot coming from a professional like yourself. Ironically almost every photo was shoot with fill from a reflector(except #2&4). I Started the day off with a flash with a low CTO attached but quickly realised it was wayyy to slow and underpowered to fight mid-day sun. I really was lost trying to compensate the harsh light from the sun. Tried to use both the silver and white side of the 5 in 1 but i think we ended up white most of the shoot. In hindsight I perhaps gave up on the flash too soon, I felt I was missing the good emotions with the almost 2sec recycle time.
What kind of fill light would be best used to fight the sun with no open shade available?

tirediron · May 29, 2018

The best option. The budget option. Reflectors are useful, but invariably, the ones people use are too small; for a group of 2-3, waist-up shot I would want a MINIMUM of a 3x4 (and ideally a 4x6) which means you need an assistant to hold it. The other issue is that most people have them too far away from the subject(s). They really need to be very close to the subject to get a useful effect.