My little family tea party in the snow

heatherfeather

I have been struggling with getting a family photo- and not having much time before Christmas. So today everyone happened to be home during daylight hours (which doesn't happen that often) and I hatched a plan. This is what we came up with. I know Mercy (the youngest) is not looking but you wouldn't have wanted to see her little mad crying face anyway... This was an exercise in patience because I don't have a remote release for my 5D yet so I was running running for every shot. And everyone was very cold. But I think this one will be just dandy on the wall and in cards for Christmas. (What it needs is to be straightened... but I don't have room. I seriously only had a few minutes of cooperation from my family while I set up for this ridiculous photo.)

And my 10 year old son was just happy to have unlimited cookies during the 5 minute shoot. Boys.



I bet the neighbors had fun watching me race back and forth for this one too.

JulieLawsonPhotography

Looks good. I hate having to do the timer thing. You just never know. You have a lot of snow! How much daylight do you get in the winter months?

heatherfeather

Not much.... Right now it gets dark around 4:00 and it is nearly Winter solstice.

I have the remote for my other camera, but of course I didn't use it.

Agnieszka

This is SUCH a wonderful idea, I loooooove it!!!!!!!! (I can't believe you have 3 kids and one of them is already 10 years old ) ....

(Is it going to be your christmas card?)

Eia

This is an excellent Christmas family photo!!! It is an original idea and the tone of it is great!

I've done one for years. As our boys got older it got more difficult. I know what you mean by having literally a few moments to get a photo...that is all they will give! I have already got it in my mind that next year's card will have a landscape!

Merry Christmas!

roentarre

Such a good shot with great colour there

heatherfeather

Agnieszka wrote:

This is SUCH a wonderful idea, I loooooove it!!!!!!!! (I can't believe you have 3 kids and one of them is already 10 years old ) ....

(Is it going to be your christmas card?)

Well I am not THAT young. (I found my first gray hair last week. Shhh)

And I guess it is. I just posted this to my extended family's website and said something to the effect of "Consider this your Christmas card..."

heatherfeather

Eia wrote:

I know what you mean by having literally a few moments to get a photo...

Merry Christmas!

Thank you! I think the whining started at minute #1... And then increased in tempo and noise for the rest of the 5. I think it will be a family favorite.

Elaine

Soo cute! What a fun idea! I love the processing. Would you mind sharing a bit about that? Were you using off-camera flash here?

PS - I think you're the queen of taking indoor situations and placing them outdoors (I'm remembering the piano shots with your sister). I'm gonna have to steal some inspiration there!

Scott_Quier

Love the idea - like Elaine said, you have a talent for taking indoor scenarios and moving them outdoors and doing it successfully!

I may be the odd person (OK, I am an odd person) out here, but I'm not loving the processing. The blue is too much - makes it much too cold for my taste.

It must be the residuals from my military career, but I don't understand a group of people whining about giving 5 or 10 minutes of their time to help someone they love do what it is that they love to do. Hmmmm ... I'll have to think on that a while before I come to an understanding.scratch

And, finally, I think you did a wonderful job with the lighting. I don't know if it's off-camera flash or just a low sun, but the light is right and the shadows aren't too much - wonderful work there!

heatherfeather

Scott_Quier wrote:

Love the idea - like Elaine said, you have a talent for taking indoor scenarios and moving them outdoors and doing it successfully!

I may be the odd person (OK, I am an odd person) out here, but I'm not loving the processing. The blue is too much - makes it much too cold for my taste.

It must be the residuals from my military career, but I don't understand a group of people whining about giving 5 or 10 minutes of their time to help someone they love do what it is that they love to do. Hmmmm ... I'll have to think on that a while before I come to an understanding.scratch

And, finally, I think you did a wonderful job with the lighting. I don't know if it's off-camera flash or just a low sun, but the light is right and the shadows aren't too much - wonderful work there!

I think the whining could possibly have been because of the temperature. It happened to be zero right about then.... And the youngest needed a nap in a bad way... And my husband, ah, well lets just say he is a sweet heart that sometimes needs to be nudged into assisting his eccentric wife do crazy things.The other two were great because they have lots of practice being chilly every day at recess and like I said there were cookies to be had.

The lighting was 1 speed light on Camera right and the sun was pretty much behind the mountains but there was still quite a bit of light to be had. I was racing to get home from church and some lunch and then set up before sundown. And we made it just in the nick of time.

heatherfeather

Elaine wrote:

Soo cute! What a fun idea! I love the processing. Would you mind sharing a bit about that? Were you using off-camera flash here?

PS - I think you're the queen of taking indoor situations and placing them outdoors (I'm remembering the piano shots with your sister). I'm gonna have to steal some inspiration there!

Processing was simple dimple. I just converted it to B & W and then made the highlights sort of a golden tone and the shadows the blue. All of 2 seconds in ACR.

Steal away Elaine! I am always trying to think of something for a centerpiece of the shot. I don't even know how I thought of it this afternoon, I guess it just came to me while I was making lunch!

dogwood

JulieLawsonPhotography wrote:

I hate having to do the timer thing. You just never know.

If you have a pocket wizard, you can remote trigger your camera. Just have to be careful to hide the hand triggering the camera.

It's easy to splice an ebay Canon remove switch cord to a mini-phone plug (Canon charges a fortune for the same cord). But if you want to use lights, you'll need a PW Multimax to relay the flash so it triggers at the same time the shutter is open.

It's easier than it sounds (provided you have the multimax already) -- I promise!

jeffreaux2

I like it...everything about it.

heatherfeather

dogwood wrote:

If you have a pocket wizard, you can remote trigger your camera. Just have to be careful to hide the hand triggering the camera.

It's easy to splice an ebay Canon remove switch cord to a mini-phone plug (Canon charges a fortune for the same cord). But if you want to use lights, you'll need a PW Multimax to relay the flash so it triggers at the same time the shutter is open.

It's easier than it sounds (provided you have the multimax already) -- I promise!

Well you are right- it sounds complicated.
But I am trying to understand what you said!
So, I just looked up "pocket wizard multimax" ($265 at B & H.) I am assuming that would be instead of the STE2. And then perhaps use the Paramount Miniphone (Pocket Wizard) to Hot Shoe Sync Cord ($35.95) to receive transmission on my speed lights? Wouldn't I then loose my lovely ETTL capabilities? I am still a baby at lighting and learning ALL the time. The whole phone plug thing you mentioned is quite a bit out there beyond me yet. But no line of sight sure sounds wonderful!

tonichelle

what a great idea... I wish my family would play along, but nooooooooooooo the kids will get too cold and who wants to sit in the stuff anyway.


and they wonder why I stay in my room without them lol

jeffreaux2

heatherfeather wrote:

Well you are right- it sounds complicated.
But I am trying to understand what you said!
So, I just looked up "pocket wizard multimax" ($265 at B & H.) I am assuming that would be instead of the STE2. And then perhaps use the Paramount Miniphone (Pocket Wizard) to Hot Shoe Sync Cord ($35.95) to receive transmission on my speed lights? Wouldn't I then loose my lovely ETTL capabilities? I am still a baby at lighting and learning ALL the time. The whole phone plug thing you mentioned is quite a bit out there beyond me yet. But no line of sight sure sounds wonderful!

Or, you could use a canon wireless remote to fire the camera with you in the frame.....and still use the ste2 and ETTL simplicity. Under $20 I think.

He wasn't referring to the pocket wizard for the flashes....but only as a trigger for the camera.

zoomer

Now that looks like fun...believe me I know how difficult it can be to get the family to cooperate.

I like the colors as it makes it feel even colder.

You may be able to add some canvas to the print, straighten it and then clone in the snow from the left bottom onto the right bottom and mess with it till it looks right...of course you may spend 30 minute fooling with it to find you are never going to get it quite right (experience talking).

It looks pretty darn good as is!!

grimace

Wonderful job. Very original.

heatherfeather

jeffreaux2 wrote:

Or, you could use a canon wireless remote to fire the camera with you in the frame.....and still use the ste2 and ETTL simplicity. Under $20 I think.

He wasn't referring to the pocket wizard for the flashes....but only as a trigger for the camera.

Yeah, I have one of those for my old camera... and its on the ever growing never ending list. Of course I traded pixels for the remote, so, eh, I was happy.

Scott_Quier

dogwood wrote:

If you have a pocket wizard, you can remote trigger your camera. Just have to be careful to hide the hand triggering the camera.

It's easy to splice an ebay Canon remove switch cord to a mini-phone plug (Canon charges a fortune for the same cord). But if you want to use lights, you'll need a PW Multimax to relay the flash so it triggers at the same time the shutter is open.

It's easier than it sounds (provided you have the multimax already) -- I promise!

I'm asking b/c I don't know ....

Couldn't one rig up the camera trigger as you outline, put another PW in the hotshoe of the camera (on a different channel from the camera trigger) and use that to trigger your off-camera flashes?. The setup, as I have outlined, would require 4 PWs but if one already had them would this work?

glennp

Great shot! Really like the look and feel.

glenn

jeffreaux2

Scott_Quier wrote:

I'm asking b/c I don't know ....

Couldn't one rig up the camera trigger as you outline, put another PW in the hotshoe of the camera (on a different channel from the camera trigger) and use that to trigger your off-camera flashes?. The setup, as I have outlined, would require 4 PWs but if one already had them would this work?

I don't know for sure, but think that you can do exactly as you described.

Have you ever seen the pile of unmanned PW triggered cameras behind the goals of pro soccer games? Its impressive, and I wanna say there is a flash in the bunch here and there as well.

dogwood

jeffreaux2 wrote:

Or, you could use a canon wireless remote to fire the camera with you in the frame.....and still use the ste2 and ETTL simplicity. Under $20 I think.

He wasn't referring to the pocket wizard for the flashes....but only as a trigger for the camera.

I was actually referring to firing both the camera and strobes with the PW. That's where the Multimax comes in-- it has the relay for your strobe. Otherwise the camera goes off at a different time than the strobe due to the shutter delay (which, though we might not notice it, is noticed by the PW's).

The STE2 works for the strobe part too, but IR won't work in bright sunlight and it's only line of sight so it's rather limited in my experience.

dogwood

Scott_Quier wrote:

I'm asking b/c I don't know ....

Couldn't one rig up the camera trigger as you outline, put another PW in the hotshoe of the camera (on a different channel from the camera trigger) and use that to trigger your off-camera flashes?. The setup, as I have outlined, would require 4 PWs but if one already had them would this work?

Scott -- your method would work but the easier method is to use three PW's (assuming you have a multimax). One as trigger, one to fire the strobe, and a third to fire both the camera and strobe. The multimax basically relays from the shutter to the flash and sits in the hotshoe. It works the exact same way as your method though-- ie the camera fires on channel 2, the PW then waits just a fraction of a second before firing the strobe on channel 3.

Yes, you do lose ETTL but if you have a Sekonic meter with the optional chip, you can easily meter your strobe remotely using a PW.

Andrew Gould

As Scott says, this is a great idea. I think, though, that I would have gone for a little more highlight detail in those brightest whites round the jacket hood edge, or burned it in a bit. You and others may feel this is picky -- and I admit it's a minor point -- but it somehow attracted my attention immediately. A really nice family shot, anyway!