Family Groups

Borderfox

I had seen a thread about getting family groups photographed and had only done one of these last week so thought I would share my thoughts and techniques on how I went about it.

It was up local to me and I had done the PR job with Archipel earlier on in the day. The brief was a 50th Wedding Anniversary with around 40 people attending (this means 40 people on the group shot just in case anybody is quoting for these) I arrived at the venue and had a quick scout around to see where to do it and the end of the restaurant looked great (there was a function room at the other end of the Hotel but this way too far away) I took a few shots just to capture atmosphere and some of the smaller family shots outside where there was a seating area.

I had two tripods and two speedlights, a 430 ex on the left and a 580exII on the left bouncing off the ceiling. Camera was a 1dmk3 with a 17-40L f4 and another 580exII used as master for the other two. 1/160th (I was standing on a chair and wobbling a bit)and f7.1 (good dof) with ISO 800 used. Camera is always set to 1/3rd of a stop over and the flash compensation was 2/3rd's over. All flashes fired and no other problems
I organised a line of seats in front and positioned the main family members on the seats and then set to organising the rest of the family behind in an ascending order (trying!!) to make sure that I can see everybody can see me and they were all looking in the same direction and that any children werent putting fingers up behind anybody (they do!!)

Made everybody say "Smelly socks" (seems to work) and heres the shot. My bad but a bit of PP on the bottom left but not to bad considering my back was up against the rest of the furniture.

If anybody has any other methods or questions feel free to ask. Click picture to see full size

Dodgykeeper

Would nobody have given the poor oul wan with the crutch a seat, and your man next to her looking happy as larry!

AnimalRights

Granny bottom left has her left foot AWOL!
Looked at your pixie sizes and they don't seem that sharp.
Not claiming I good do better obviously, just saying.

City-Exile

When you use the 17-40mm f/4 open wide, you're always going to get soft edges.
I think it's important not to fill the frame too much for groups and crop afterwards.
Also, with big groups in a curved seating arrangement, where you're using a wide lens, it's usually better to have the taller people in the middle at the back, as those at the front sides will look bigger, given the nature of the wide lens.

smelltheglove

Aprreciate that Broder, oen thing I often get nervy about if the group shot.

A little bit of silliness always helps a group and I see this group is slightly older than what I am used to, my method with groups is at the last moment choose my focus pint, broaden my view so crop when I get a funny angle later, and throw my hand in the air going 'hooray' evryone follows suit and you get a great laughing picture.

I will keep the smelly socks one in my pocket for the older groups (although I prefer smelly gloves),

Borderfox

I said above it was at f7.1

Looks more than sharp enough printed at 8x12 which is the largest they wanted.

City-Exile wrote: »

When you use the 17-40mm f/4 open wide, you're always going to get soft edges.
I think it's important not to fill the frame too much for groups and crop afterwards.
Also, with big groups in a curved seating arrangement, where you're using a wide lens, it's usually better to have the taller people in the middle at the back, as those at the front sides will look bigger, given the nature of the wide lens.

AnimalRights

Just going by the Pixie, not seen it printed.