How to take my own family portrait?

Question

Hi all! I've been getting requests from my family for a professional-looking family portrait of my husband and I and our kids, like what you'd get from Olan Mills. How should I go about doing this? I need some suggestions on lighting, backdrops, camera settings, etc. I've never taken a portrait photo before, just candid shots, so I'm kinda clueless. Thanks for any advice.

Answer 1

Taking group photographs is difficult, because capturing a single image in which everyone looks good is almost impossible. What usually happens is that in one shot, someone has their eyes closed, but someone else has got the most adorable smile. Check the next shot, everyone has their eyes open, but one person is picking a poppy seed out of their teeth. The third shot, both previous people are behaving, but grandma is yawning, tired of waiting through multiple shots. Which shot do you pick? With Image Stacks which only comes with Photoshop CS3 Extended, you can easily cut and paste to present everyone's best face. The images are automatically registered into a single composite image. This can also come in handy in case you want to remove your ex from the family reunion picture, or you before you lost the 30 pounds.

You can also get Photoshop CS3 Extended for only $74.95 from http://www.directsoftwareconnection.com.

Answer 2

Hey, first of all, i have never done any family portraits or anything like that, i'm just thinkin creatively for you. Okay, personally, i really like photographs of persons/familes taken with a pure white backdrop, here's and example of this for you:

http://flickr.com/photos/tammyaliphotogr...

I think that looks professional looking. white backdrops really compliment one's natural features. You don't have to get that fancy, and get an get a really expensive backdrop, you can get something along the lines of this:

http://www.amazon.com/Background-Clamps-...

It's not that expensive. However, getting that might not be necessary. I assume that you have a backyard which lets the blue sky and natural light in. That would also be perfect for a family portrait. Just zoom up and gather some depth of field. Open up the aperture the most that you can, so that nice blue sky, and green background can be out of focus, and complimenting your photo. However, you could just zoom all the way out, get a wide field, and create depth of field in photoshop, it's really cool, i'm reading about it. Just be original and creative, it's not that hard. I've never been asked to take anyone's photo, so i'm not professional in any means, just thinking like a photographer.

Just relax, it'll all be o.k

Answer 3

As someone who has professionally photographed families for decades..way before digital....I can tell you that it can be accomplished. First, highly doubt you are about to go out and spend hundreds on lighting,stands, posing stools and backdrop. Since Olan Mills style is FAR from the top of the line, you might as well just go to Sears or JC Penny's. If not, get someone else to snap the shutter so you won't look stressed. There are posing patterns...it depends on the age and amount of people in the image. Very basically, try to form a pyramid shape and don't block each others faces, stay close have each head on a different level but everyone on the same focal plane.

Find nice open shade...use a soft fill in flash...open the aperture to let the background soften, keep the camera far enough away so you are not using wide angle and get distortion.

http://ezinearticles.com/?Setting-Up-Gro...

I found a site with a bit of good info for you