This is a portrait of my family taken many years ago (1992?).

To explain:
1. Umbrella bounced off the back wall (warm white – almost cream) to give a whole room an ambient light level that was basically shadowless. (you cannot even see it’s reflection in the eyes). This umbrella was set very high.
2. A huge soft box (Elincrom Octa) 6 feet (1.8 mtrs) in diameter as the key light to give modelling and a 3:1 lighting ratio
3. An overhead umbrella on a boom slightly behind the group so that it’s light gives a hair light for seperation from the background but does not spill onto our noses or front. This umbrella was set to LOW power
4. The group is far enough away from the RED seamless paper background so that the umbrella doesn’t over-illuminate it.
5. a black vignetter on the camera lens.

As the background is not receiving much light it came out as a deep maroon – very effective! And the vignetter darkens its edges giving it texture and form rather than a flat featureless colour.

As lovely as this photo is there are major problems with it for which there would be no excuse if it wasn’t my family but a paid sitting.
These problems are:
1. I was wearing a short sleaved shirt and short pants so my hairy arm and a glimpse of my hairy leg is obvious. Not good – it’s a distraction!
2. I didn’t check the sleeves and they are crunched up – not a good look.
3. Not my best side to be photographed from. As you can see my further eye is smaller than my near eye. In a situation like this always set up the pose so that the smaller eye is closest to the camera.
And my excuse:
As it was a family photo where I had to arrange it, set the camera timer and jump back into place before the timer went off, and the children were as children can be, I was more interested in getting the sitting over with as quickly as possible.

Getting young children’s attention:
To get the attention of my then, very young children, I had a hand puppet of a Galah that I put over the top of the waist level finder of my Mamiya RZ67 ProS and told the children that if they watch the galah, which could be better seen through the lens of the camera, it would take the photo for us.

I had (still have somewhere) 3 hand puppets. A galah, a possum and a platypus. These were invaluable for focusing the attention of a small child when photographing them. I had different ones because children react differently to different animals. The platypus was best for shy girls because you could emulate shyness with it – and it was soooo cute. Babies and not so shy children liked the galah because it was bright and it’s hard nose and feathers could tickle them.

Hope you find all this helpful.