First family photoshoot

raebelle · Feb 20, 2019

I am brand new to photography and need some feedback. What can I improve? Does this even look professional?

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Designer · Feb 21, 2019

Welcome!

In the first shot, you need more light. Even your built-in flash set to "fill" would have helped. The preferred light source would be a speedlight positioned about 5 feet or so from the camera.

In the first shot, you should frame a little tighter.

Shooting into the sun gives you a spot of flare. Is there a filter of some kind on the front of the lens?

raebelle · Feb 21, 2019

Designer said:
Welcome!

In the first shot, you need more light. Even your built-in flash set to "fill" would have helped. The preferred light source would be a speedlight positioned about 5 feet or so from the camera.

In the first shot, you should frame a little tighter.

Shooting into the sun gives you a spot of flare. Is there a filter of some kind on the front of the lens?

Since I shot in raw can I just lighten it up in photoshop or would that ruin it? I did not use a filter. I have some that came with the camera. A UV filter. Would that help? I have a million pictures but only five percent the little girl was looking at the camera when I was closer. How far away from them should I be?

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vintagesnaps · Feb 21, 2019

Not that far away! lol Close enough to get them all in the frame with some space around them. There's too much space around the subjects in both photos, especially the first. You could try brightening it up (make copies to make adjustments on) but both look like the exposure was off.

You were facing into the sun low in the sky, and your camera's meter probably was reading that light coming in from the background. You needed to meter the scene in front of you where the people were seated.

You seem to have engaged the subjects nicely and gotten them smiling, etc. You may have some potential to do portraits and get good at it. This isn't yet professional looking quality but could be if you take time to learn first.

But first get out with your camera and learn to use it better - how to meter a scene/subject, how to get proper exposures, how to frame shots, how to have nice balance in images, etc.

Designer · Feb 21, 2019

raebelle said:
Since I shot in raw can I just lighten it up in photoshop or would that ruin it? I did not use a filter. I have some that came with the camera. A UV filter. Would that help? I have a million pictures but only five percent the little girl was looking at the camera when I was closer. How far away from them should I be?

Personally, I have never seen an example of editing that can imitate light coming from the side. Of course, try it if you want, but if it ruins it, then don't give them that version. You can lighten the shot overall pretty easy, and bring up the shadows, which will help, but if you don't have a flash attachment yet, then you should plan to get one and have a way to fire it off the camera.

No, don't put a filter on now. With the green cast to the flare, I thought that it might have been a filter that tinted it green.

Not so much close or far, but if you make your subjects comfortable by being farther away, then do that. Then, afterward you can crop to a better composition. Also, you can (and probably should) use a longer lens, which means that you would naturally be farther back anyway.

Try bringing up the shadows a bit, especially in the top shot, and show us how it worked.

Designer · Feb 21, 2019

BTW: placing your subjects against the sun is not a technique that is easy to pull off successfully, and only with careful preparation and some skill. As vintage snaps (above) wrote; correct metering of the scene or more light at the very minimum to get a good exposure.

Way back in the long-ago days, we were taught to stand with your back to the sun so whatever you were shooting would be in full sun. I realize that these days people expect a certain artistic technique even in family informal portraits, but as I wrote; it's not exactly easy.

tirediron · Feb 21, 2019

Moved to an appropriate gallery for criqique.

raebelle said:
I am brand new to photography and need some feedback. What can I improve? Does this even look professional?

In order: Welcome; Almost everything; and no. Lots of good feedback already, but I'll add my $00.02 to the list. The first image is a write-off; it's at least two stops under-exposed and even if you adjust the exposure for the people, the rest will look less than stellar; you could get a usable image from it, but it would take a LOT of work. As mentioned, shooting into the sun takes a lot of skill and usually supplemental lighting as well. The issue that no has commented on here is the posing... You've got the largest member of the group near to the camera and one of the smallest farthest away. There are two ways (IMO) that this could have been improved: Dad, mom, boy, girl or Dad, boy, girl mom. Also watch hands and feet; they don't need to be identical, but you should have them doing something similar, and please, get them to sit up straight!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The second image is better; the exposure is close enough that you could work with it, 'though there's still a lot of work required. I like the casual, relaxed and happy moment you've captured here, but we need to see a little more of Mom's face.

Shooting "loose" or "large", that is capturing much more area in the image than you need isn't a bad thing as it allows you to crop in post. Be careful however that you don't shoot too loosely as image quality will degrade significantly as you crop in post. These are family portraits, so we need to see the family, NOT the trees and grass. I would suggest a 4x5 crop for both of these and eliminate as much of the scene that isn't the family as possible.

It's a good start, but there's a lot of room for improvement, most importantly in the lighting. Just because you're outside doesn't mean you can leave your strobes at home!

Derrel · Feb 21, 2019

Sixty seconds of work with Lightoom's fill light slider would be a good use of software's corrective capability,like this: add fill light to the shadows,then darken the blacks: a 4 to 5 aspect ratio crop was applied.