Family Shoot

I love shooting family groups, especially when there is a good mix between young and old children and everyone gets along. We had the please of having Mike and Kathryn and their 4 children in the studio over the weekend for a portrait shoot.

Setting up for this type of shoot is relatively easy; f8, point and click is the general rule but there are some things to bear in mind for the lighting. We use 4 lights for portraits in the studio - 2 illuminate the back-wall nicely and 2 are used for the subjects. Not all lights are used at once though, for some shots the back lights are switched off - for example, when we want a black or an off-white background. The subject lights may both be used where there is a large group or only one used where there is just a couple or a single subject.

Anyway, to show the difference - here are some examples.

 

 Shot at f11, black background unlit, 2 softboxes left and right of the group

Same front lighting, white background lit with 2 softboxes left and right

Same shot, single softbox left and high of subjects, white background unlit - second shot shows treatment to black and white with vignetting.

If you want to learn these effects, please visit the website and contact us for details of our training courses.

Paul

Welcome to my Blog

Hi, and welcome to my blog - the home of my photographic musings as my career in photography develops.

I'm Paul, the owner and operator of Paul Richards Photography. I chose to use my second name for the company to establish a different brand - and because I'm not that keen to use my real surname - Ricketts. I've been involved in photography since the early 90's when I bought my first film-SLR camera. It was a Canon, and I've used the brand ever since. Currently, I shoot with Canon's professional 1D III camera with pro-series lenses.I also co-own Vibranti with my wife, we rebranded my old photographic company in 2009 from Chiswick Photographic.

We provide professional portraiture, portfolio-development, commercial and corporate photography primarily around Sydney, Australia but do travel interstate and internationally.

Please feel free to check out the website and contact me for more details.

Paul