One child is a missionary, visiting from another continent. Another child is an out-of-state college student. When will we see this family all together again? Nobody knows.
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The mom asked me to take a family portrait, and between everybody's hectic schedules, we only had the one opportunity, so here's what I did. I scoured the web for samples of family portraits, to see if I could get some ideas for lighting and positioning. When I went to the house, I had three rough sketches for suggested poses. This is the first time I started a project with a drawing..
Mrs. Craver accompanied me, and was a tremendous help because she notices things that escape my attention. After I explained that I need to work on the camera settings and positioning of the flash, I said that they could relax, and I would tell them when I was ready to take the actual pictures. They ended up with three final proofs, but it took sixty shots to get there. Portraits have been my biggest photographic challenge..
I feel pretty good about the idea to separate them into two groups. Mom & Dad are together in the foreground, and their grown children are clumped together about a foot behind them. If I had not done that, I would have dwarfed the parents, because these kids are so tall! The back wall is creme colored, or off white, but solid. I got that look by placing two incandescent lamps on the floor behind the family and two bounced flashes lit the family. What do you think... any helpful advice? What would you have done differently?
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