Family shoot advice - 4 grandchildren

[AndrewSt]

inusually shiot weddings and I am comfortable with couple or individual portraits.

I have been asked to shoot 4 boy, aged between 4 and 18 as a xmas present for their grandparents.

I don't do formal studio shots, my style is very much natural light on location.

Any tips for posing? Ideas that work will with this sort of group?

I imagine I will have to work quick to maintain their interest.

 

[connersz]

You must of photographed small groups or groups of kids outdoors during some of your weddings?

 

[The23rdman]

Keep them close, think of triangles with the heads and try and keep their heads on the same focal plane as much as possible.

 

[AndrewSt]

You must of photographed small groups or groups of kids outdoors during some of your weddings?

Of course but not really as the only part of a shoot. Would expect more pictures and different poses compared to a few quick shots during a fast wedding!

 

[connersz]

If you're doing an outdoor shoot, try and persuade them to go somewhere where there is a big outdoor space and keep everyone moving. I do a lot of outdoor sessions and at some of my most popular places I have a couple of preferred routes that I take people on, this helps to combat people getting bored and small children running away. Try to avoid people's gardens or woods that you're not familiar with. In most people's gardens you will find a lot of overhead powerlines and other weird background items, there's also less freedom if the sun is particularly strong as this will limit your ability to move around. A lot of people see a wood as a good place to go but a lot of them can seem rather nasty looking in the images, especially those with very spindly looking trees.

I like to start sessions with the more formal poses like Dean mentioned, aiming for a triangle effect which you can do standing and sitting and towards the end of the session when everyone's getting a bit bored of that you can do the more adventurous ones like getting them to lay on the floor, piling them on top of each other, sitting in tress etc. this order has the other benefit of keeping most of the mud off people until the end of the session.