Three Styles, One Portrait Session

On a recent shoot I sought to capture an extremely diverse feel across the 60 minutes we spent shooting. The end result shows it this clearly--from sunset lighting on my subjects' faces to off camera flash fill to near darkness with flash. Finally I shot a quick series without flash, allowing the ambient light reflecting off the lake to paint my subject's face. And how starkly different the shoot turned out--beyond consistent wardrobe, it looks like we shot on different days and locations, yet all was done within a 50 yard radius across in less time than it takes to watch an episode of 'Flash Forward'.

The light shifted so fast we could hardly sit still--throwing rocks in the lake is way too much fun, but we quickly moved on and did the group pose on the big rocks on the shore.

Then we played some more and then ran up to a park bench for a few more shots. A group posed then the final series with just my client's son and no flash, just post-sunset skylight bouncing off of the lake. Then we jumped on a small pier and shot with off-camera flash and dialed in the ambient sunset light to really pop.

In the end, we created a whole series of unique compositions. And by scheduling the shoot around a span of time where the light would be most dynamic, we made plenty of special moments to choose from for wall portraits.