Group photos in sunlight

I seem to get roped into doing periodic group shots of our company staff,
about 30 people usually.

The only suitable place to stand everyone is on the front steps to the
building, which is south facing, but whenever it is sunny, like today, the
pictures never seem to look very good, which shadows & blown highlights etc

Are there any hints for getting better shots in sunshine, or is it best just
to wait for a cloudy day, as the pictures look fine when there are some
clouds.

cheers adrian www.boliston.co.uk

On Jul 24, 8:12 am, "Adrian Boliston" wrote:
I seem to get roped into doing periodic group shots of our company staff,
about 30 people usually.

The only suitable place to stand everyone is on the front steps to the
building, which is south facing, but whenever it is sunny, like today, the
pictures never seem to look very good, which shadows & blown highlights etc

Are there any hints for getting better shots in sunshine, or is it best just
to wait for a cloudy day, as the pictures look fine when there are some
clouds.

cheers adrianwww.boliston.co.uk

Your post leads a few things dangling. First off, you have sunny days
in the UK? Really?

Second off, why do you keep taking pictures of your staff?

But anyway, you should do one (or more) of a couple of things:

take the pictures in the morning when the isn't so strong.

wait for a cloudy day.

angle the people away from the sun so they are squinting, and use fill
flash

find a new location

find a new country

put up a diffuser to cut the light -- something like a large tent.

do the pictures indoors.

call in sick that day.

On 2007-07-24 05:12:49 -0700, "Adrian Boliston" said:

I seem to get roped into doing periodic group shots of our company staff,
about 30 people usually.

The only suitable place to stand everyone is on the front steps to the
building, which is south facing, but whenever it is sunny, like today, the
pictures never seem to look very good, which shadows & blown highlights etc

Are there any hints for getting better shots in sunshine, or is it best just
to wait for a cloudy day, as the pictures look fine when there are some
clouds.

cheers adrian www.boliston.co.uk

People do not look good in hard lighting like direct sunlight. The
shadows are too dark and too hard edged. If you cannot avoid taking
pictures in conditions like that, hanging a sheet up to reflect light
into the shadowy areas or to provide some shade might be the best
solution.
--
Waddling Eagle
World Famous Flight Instructor

Adrian Boliston wrote:

I seem to get roped into doing periodic group shots of our company staff,
about 30 people usually.

The only suitable place to stand everyone is on the front steps to the
building, which is south facing, but whenever it is sunny, like today, the
pictures never seem to look very good, which shadows & blown highlights etc

Are there any hints for getting better shots in sunshine, or is it best just
to wait for a cloudy day, as the pictures look fine when there are some
clouds.

Photoshop to the rescue: shoot in raw & reduce contrast, burn & dodge
around the faces, etc.
http://www.edgehill.net/1/?SC=go.php&DIR=2_human-world/4-People/more/groups&PG=3

--
Paul Furman Photography
http://www.edgehill.net/1
Bay Natives Nursery
http://www.baynatives.com

Paul Furman wrote:
Adrian Boliston wrote:

I seem to get roped into doing periodic group shots of our company
staff, about 30 people usually.

The only suitable place to stand everyone is on the front steps to the
building, which is south facing, but whenever it is sunny, like today,
the pictures never seem to look very good, which shadows & blown
highlights etc

Are there any hints for getting better shots in sunshine, or is it
best just to wait for a cloudy day, as the pictures look fine when
there are some clouds.

Photoshop to the rescue: shoot in raw & reduce contrast, burn & dodge
around the faces, etc.
http://www.edgehill.net/1/?SC=go.php&DIR=2_human-world/4-People/more/groups&PG=3


Nice. Could you post the before pic as well? Do you use Lightroom? The
fill light on the RAW file is pretty good, but of course it's not localized.

--

John McWilliams

John McWilliams wrote:

Paul Furman wrote:

Adrian Boliston wrote:

I seem to get roped into doing periodic group shots of our company
staff, about 30 people usually.

The only suitable place to stand everyone is on the front steps to
the building, which is south facing, but whenever it is sunny, like
today, the pictures never seem to look very good, which shadows &
blown highlights etc

Are there any hints for getting better shots in sunshine, or is it
best just to wait for a cloudy day, as the pictures look fine when
there are some clouds.

Photoshop to the rescue: shoot in raw & reduce contrast, burn & dodge
around the faces, etc.
http://www.edgehill.net/1/?SC=go.php&DIR=2_human-world/4-People/more/groups&PG=3

Nice. Could you post the before pic as well?

http://www.edgehill.net/1/?SC=go.php&DIR=California/Bay-Area/Peninsula/sweeney-ridge/2007-03-04/orig
That's just a quick crop, reduce & sharpen in irfanview, not even
changing the AdobeRGB color space to sRGB.

Do you use Lightroom? The
fill light on the RAW file is pretty good, but of course it's not
localized.

As you can see, I underexposed by 2/3 stop to maintain the white
teeshirts & it looks like I only did minimal brightening in some of the
faces with wide brimmed hats, mostly I think it was just raising the
brightness & reducing contrast & shadows in CS1 ACR. There is no 'fill
light' in CS1 ACR, just brightness, shadows & contrast. I rarely adjust EC.

Here's one that was really challenging & still doesn't look great but it
would have been awful with default P&S settings, even my in-camera jpeg
was set at lowest contrast and is wildly under/overexposed:
http://www.edgehill.net/1/?SC=go.php&DIR=California/Bay-Area/Peninsula/2007-03-18-los-trancos/group/orig
You can see some weird glows around some faces where I burned & dodged,
plus it was 2 shots merged to get the best smiles on everyone. My idea
of burning & dodging is usually a curves adjustment layer masked out
with a broad soft edged eraser. Conditions like this, you just can't get
useable results straight out of the camera.


--
Paul Furman Photography
http://www.edgehill.net/1
Bay Natives Nursery
http://www.baynatives.com

Paul Furman wrote:
John McWilliams wrote:

Paul Furman wrote:

Nice. Could you post the before pic as well?

http://www.edgehill.net/1/?SC=go.php&DIR=California/Bay-Area/Peninsula/sweeney-ridge/2007-03-04/orig

That's just a quick crop, reduce & sharpen in irfanview, not even
changing the AdobeRGB color space to sRGB.

Do you use Lightroom? The fill light on the RAW file is pretty good,
but of course it's not localized.

As you can see, I underexposed by 2/3 stop to maintain the white
teeshirts & it looks like I only did minimal brightening in some of the
faces with wide brimmed hats, mostly I think it was just raising the
brightness & reducing contrast & shadows in CS1 ACR. There is no 'fill
light' in CS1 ACR, just brightness, shadows & contrast. I rarely adjust EC.

Here's one that was really challenging & still doesn't look great but it
would have been awful with default P&S settings, even my in-camera jpeg
was set at lowest contrast and is wildly under/overexposed:
http://www.edgehill.net/1/?SC=go.php&DIR=California/Bay-Area/Peninsula/2007-03-18-los-trancos/group/orig

You can see some weird glows around some faces where I burned & dodged,
plus it was 2 shots merged to get the best smiles on everyone. My idea
of burning & dodging is usually a curves adjustment layer masked out
with a broad soft edged eraser. Conditions like this, you just can't get
useable results straight out of the camera.


Thanks for the original, on both shots. That last one is a bear. Esp.
the guy on the left who's overexposed to begin with. I'd be happy to see
what I could do with the RAW image in CS3 or LR.

--
john mcwilliams

John McWilliams wrote:
Paul Furman wrote:

Here's one that was really challenging & still doesn't look great but
it would have been awful with default P&S settings, even my in-camera
jpeg was set at lowest contrast and is wildly under/overexposed:
http://www.edgehill.net/1/?SC=go.php&DIR=California/Bay-Area/Peninsula/2007-03-18-los-trancos/group/orig

You can see some weird glows around some faces where I burned &
dodged, plus it was 2 shots merged to get the best smiles on everyone.
My idea of burning & dodging is usually a curves adjustment layer
masked out with a broad soft edged eraser. Conditions like this, you
just can't get useable results straight out of the camera.

Thanks for the original, on both shots. That last one is a bear. Esp.
the guy on the left who's overexposed to begin with. I'd be happy to see
what I could do with the RAW image in CS3 or LR.

OK I sent you the raw file. Actually it looks like I didn't even use the
raw file on that one because there's no XMP files in my archive so that
was just photoshop curves on a jpeg. The first one looks like it was
done from raw in CS3 beta when I was testing that.

--
Paul Furman Photography
http://www.edgehill.net/1
Bay Natives Nursery
http://www.baynatives.com

Paul Furman writes:

Photoshop to the rescue:

Huh. Photoshop fixes people squinting and grimacing in full sun now?

Richard J Kinch wrote:
Paul Furman writes:

Photoshop to the rescue:

Huh. Photoshop fixes people squinting and grimacing in full sun now?

Yes, Image- Adjustments - Time control- Shift time back 6 hours.

--
lsmft