Last week I had the chance to take what I consider the coolest family portrait I have ever taken. Beforehand the couple to me they wanted to get a few of your normal type family portraits but then wanted to go outside and get some photos with their ATV and their son’s ride-on toy ATV. I tried to spend some time coming up with ideas for lighting the scene and then it hit me. I would attempt a 4 light setup (2 rim lights and 2 frontal).
When I got to the scene I found a spot on the top of an embankment on a large pile of leaves. Pine trees in the background. I thought, “ok, this should work”. I had the couple backup the ATVs to the edge. The I went half way down the hill and setup the stands and two bare sb25s at 1/2 power back behind then to create a hard edge rim light. It took some time to dig around to clear a flat surface for the stands.
Then it was on to the two lights in front. I was daring and setup two stands with sb25s WITH bounce umbrellas. It was a little windy and yes there were a few crashes. It happens. Once the umbrellas and just right I moved in the toy ATV. Shot a few frames to check the scene. I ended up raising the toy up with a spare tire and board over that. Then covered it with leaves. Everyone was in place. Adjusted exposure and there it was… the coolest family portrait I have ever shot: (below you will find a few other shots from the day too)
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