Home · Register · Join Upload & Sell

Moderated by: Fred Miranda
Username  

  New fredmiranda.com Mobile Site
  New Feature: SMS Notification alert
  New Feature: Buy & Sell Watchlist
  

FM Forums | Lighting & Studio Techniques | Join Upload & Sell

  

Archive 2013 · Family of 14 in small studio -> stitch 2 sections together?

  
 
rabbitmountain
Offline
• • • •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · Family of 14 in small studio -> stitch 2 sections together?


Hi,

My studio is small (white or black bg paper size is 2.6 metres) and I'm asked to shoot a family of 14 (8 adults, 6 children).

I can see two options:
1. Shoot half the group first, then the other half and stitch together in PS
2. I can get a 3,6m wide background and try to fit them all in

Anyone tips & tricks for this?

Thanks!

Stay good,
Ralph



Jul 01, 2013 at 11:00 AM
jasoncallen
Offline
• • • •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · Family of 14 in small studio -> stitch 2 sections together?


Use a larger background, and use a telephoto lens (narrower viewing angle) to shoot the group (less background material width necessary for coverage as a result). Use subject blocking to your advantage - i.e. don't have all 14 subjects stand shoulder to shoulder, sort them in a way that makes sense (tallest-to-shortest works great for sports teams, but doesn't work well for families - grouping by parents close together in the back, kids in front works well), and take advantage of the foreground for shorter subjects. If it makes sense to do so, you can do 3 rows (i.e. dads standing, moms seated in front, kids standing/kneeling/sitting in front).

Whatever you decide, test it out with some friends ahead of time - you don't want to be monkeying about while trying to direct a family of 14 who are there on the clock as clients! I would advise against stitching groups, as it is very hard to reliably match a shot like that (perspectives look weird, and depending on your photoshopping skills, lighting may seem to be unnatural).

Best of luck! Post back with the shot!



Jul 01, 2013 at 04:13 PM
BrianO
Offline
• • • • •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · Family of 14 in small studio -> stitch 2 sections together?


I suggest a third option: shoot somewhere else.


Jul 01, 2013 at 06:32 PM
jefferies1
Offline
• • • •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · Family of 14 in small studio -> stitch 2 sections together?


Do you have a white wall. Just use the seamless on the floor. 14 people no matter how many levels and rows take up a lot of space.
Add the extra side background in PS where required.




Jul 02, 2013 at 10:08 AM
cgardner
Offline
• • • • •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · Family of 14 in small studio -> stitch 2 sections together?


Possible with good planning but lots of work in post processing. To help model the blocking for family shots I created a simulator in Photoshop with each figure on a different layer so I could move them around and try different arrangements in advance of a family group shot like the families of two siblings...

http://super.nova.org/XP/Posing/GroupPosingKit.jpg

If you do something similar to plan the shot and use it as blueprint when arranging the different family group components you should be able to pull it off seamlessly. In a group shot the spacing of heads conveys intimacy between the people in the photo and vertical relationships the family hierarchy. I like to have the heads of couples touching and if a woman is considerably shorter than her husband I'll have her stand on something so the relationship of the two heads looks pleasing compositionally in the photo. Same with the kids. I see a lot of family shots where the head of the youngest is so much lower than the others they don't look like part of the same family.

A good rule of thumb to keep in mind that I find works well is to pose each person in a way that would look good in a solo portrait. So for a family group I'd pose Dad first, add Mom, then add each kid individually rather than try to wrangle all of them at once. That can quickly become an exercise like herding cats, especially when there are small kids involved. Keeping that approach in mind should help avoid anyone looking out of place in the final composite.

The most challenging aspects will be near/far perspective and continuity in the lighting patterns. Keeping near/far perspective similar requires shooting each segment from the same distance. To avoid continuity problems in the the lighting between sections I'd suggest using a centered "butterfly" style key / fill pattern rather than key lighting from the side. Centered patterns for groups put the same pattern on all the faces and height differences between kids and parents don't affect the pattern as much as when key lit from the side.



Jul 02, 2013 at 01:06 PM





FM Forums | Lighting & Studio Techniques | Join Upload & Sell

    
 

You are not logged in. Login or Register

Username       Or Reset password



This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.