Family Photo Question

PhotomandyPhotomandy Registered Users Posts: 2 Beginner grinner
edited October 31, 2011 in People
Got this from a client - how would you respond? Pictures were great - they had 4 kids and the youngest's smile wasn't bad - just not as genuine. He was shy and I'd never met them before.

I received the CD of our pictures. The picture quality was great and we were pleased with the individual shots, but we were fairly disappointed in our family shots. None of them included our youngest with a decent smile, which we were oblivious to as we were facing you and not able to see our children’s expressions. We were really hoping to have at least one shot of everyone smiling for the effort expended on both your and our parts. I don’t want to sound too negative, but thought I would share a piece of positive criticism.

Comments

  • divamumdivamum Registered Users Posts: 9,021 Major grins
    edited October 31, 2011
    I have no idea how one should respond (and look forward to folks' input on that) but I have to say IMO it's pretty unrealistic of the family (how young is the youngest?). While of course our job as photographers is to get the beset expressions we can from people, there are limits! On a plus note, they expressed their reservations politely, but even so....

    Can you create an "everybody smiling" shot with some headswapping?
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  • HackboneHackbone Registered Users Posts: 4,027 Major grins
    edited October 31, 2011
    That is just part of working with the public. Do you have a good expressin of him in at least one photo that you can swap heads with.....and I would charge for that service......don't prostitute your services just because you can. You always need to explain to a group that you can get at least one great shot of an individual by theirselves but in a group you will always have one subject not at his/her best.....it is a simple face of life.....you have to go for the average.

    I believe the parents are being unrealistic so don't beat yourself up too bad.
    Charles
    www.cameraone.biz
  • zoomerzoomer Registered Users Posts: 3,688 Major grins
    edited October 31, 2011
    Sometimes it just doesn't happen, especially if you are working by yourself and don't have someone to act silly and make the kids smile.
    As others mentioned, is head swapping an option?
    http://www.flickr.com/photos/21695902@N06/
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  • PhotomandyPhotomandy Registered Users Posts: 2 Beginner grinner
    edited October 31, 2011
    zoomer wrote: »
    Sometimes it just doesn't happen, especially if you are working by yourself and don't have someone to act silly and make the kids smile.
    As others mentioned, is head swapping an option?


    All very good thoughts - I really appreciate everyone's input. I'm not at my hard drive, so I'll check on the head swapping thing. It's just a bummer of an email to read, even when put politely. I need thicker skin, I guess. And some sort of juggler/clown behind me at all times.
  • jonh68jonh68 Registered Users Posts: 2,711 Major grins
    edited October 31, 2011
    If you are lucky, maybe all you have to do is liquify a smile, or clone in a smile from another picture without having to do a full blown headswap.
    www.jonimages.com
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