First Try

[windzup]

Well here's my first try of taking a pic of the family. Pointers would be very much appreciated.

family by Rob Tomlin, on Flickr

 

[Braineack]

cutout aside, there's too much side lighting on this shot.

Your key, was it very high and above the subjects? It looks like it filled mom's face decently, but look at the kid's. The middle of there faces are in shadow and only the tips of their noses got any light. I can see you tired to unnaturally brighten their eyes to try to combat this issue.

The light camera left is too intense, and brighter than your key and left a nasty hot spot on mom's head.

I'm quite found of a simple key + camera axis fill lighting profile. The straight on fill acts as a base and controls how deep of shadows you want and gives nice even light across the subjects. Then you can position the key to provide broad or short light and good catch lights for the keys. See my latest post in the people gallery. for this lighting profile.


looking at your exif, I'm also guessing this was all natural/available lighting?

 

[windzup]

Thank you so much for your feed back I’ll take everything on board a lot to learn but that’s half the fun