Comments on: 8 Family Portaits Tips

By: Jim

Jim — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 16:13:40 +0000

What do you do about the person in the group who doesn’t want their picture taken and therefore stirs up the rest of the group?

By: Ausdoc

Ausdoc — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 05:32:45 +0000

Dear Tami McNeil,
Have you tried the site esupport.sony.com? There are many manuals and handbooks there.

By: wutswut

wutswut — Wed, 29 Dec 2010 16:29:34 +0000

The tips are generally very good, but the photo doesn’t back them up.

Joey has a lot of good points. If you’re going to blog, you should know basic grammar, punctuation and spelling. “Your” is possessive and “you’re” means “you are.” Just always think of the apostrophe as a replacement for missing letters. Note that the period and comma belong inside the quotes. (ex. Remember “levels.” / such as “vibrant,” “bold,” “pastels,”) I also agree with all of Joey’s comments about photography.

Here are a few other things to remember.
1. You should always make sure your horizon is straight unless the goal is to do an edgy obviously slanted horizon. I understand that this photo was taken from a low viewpoint on purpose, but these people look like they’re all sitting on a hill; however, it’s not slanted enough to appear as if it’s an intentional slant.
2. If you’re selling a photo, you SHOULD stress about avoiding splotchy lighting. Reflectors or fill flash can be used to avoid it. If it’s just your own family in the shot, then you can get away with it and maybe fix it in Photoshop.
3. Make sure the colors (white balance) are accurate and everything doesn’t look too yellow.
4. It’s distracting (and kind of ugly) to show the bottoms of a subject’s shoes.
5. Make sure parts of people’s faces are not hidden behind other people (like the man’s chin).
This picture could be improved somewhat in Photoshop by using levels or curves, straighten tool, and color adjustments.

By: Dan Eternal Images Photography

Dan Eternal Images Photography — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 20:25:24 +0000

On a bright sunny day, find a spot of shade, an overhang, or any place where the sun isn’t shining directly on your subjects at or near midday. If that is not possible, then put the sun behind them and use something to reflect some light back towards them. A white poster board, a wall behind you, anything that is light, neutral colored and reflects some softer light. A white vehicle even works. Learn to be creative with what you have on hand. While the tree is a great setting, you may want to be creative in your positioning of your subjects and/or the positioning and angle you are shooting from to try to eliminate background clutter. It that is not an option use an aperture of f8.0, 5.6 or possibly 4.0 and a longer lens (telephoto lens) to blur the cluttered background. Pro lenses often open up to f2.8 or more to create a great bokeh (that nicely blurred background). Take you camera to a mall, park or other public place and inconspicuously practice some of this. It is a great way to improve by practice, and you can self critique your efforts.

By: John

John — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 20:36:57 +0000

Kristy,

I couldn’t agree more. He needs to zip it. Talks too much.

Daniel Van,

What I do in photoshop is to make a layer that is solid white on top of the photo, then tone down the opacity of the layer to 2-5 or which ever would make you happy. That usually gives me a softer or a washed out effect. I hope that helps

By: kristy

kristy — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 05:36:58 +0000

Dear Joey,
We’re all real proud of your accomplishments and apostrophe knowledge…If I were a photographer in 1927, your ideas might be relevant….and even then, your ideas would be outdated.

Great tips, Christina!

By: Elizabeth Weitz

Elizabeth Weitz — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 14:09:07 +0000

thanks for the tips for families. I have a large family photo shoot next week (11 people) and I wanted to get some creative ideas going for them. Thanks so much…you’ve helped me a lot with your posts.

By: Jennifer Moore

Jennifer Moore — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 13:54:04 +0000

I meant “gig.” “Family portraits GIG.”

Oy.

By: Jennifer Moore

Jennifer Moore — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 13:53:39 +0000

Oooo! The thoughts on storyboarding and groups of 2s and 3s are pure gold! Thanks for that! I never would have thought of that!

I may have my first family portraits give in August. *fingers crossed*

By: Globetrotting Bride

Globetrotting Bride — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 17:02:05 +0000

Great tips!! Thanks for sharing! We’re having a baby this fall so I’ll put them to good use!