Through the Generations (Themed Studio Photography )

Task Three: I am to produce a series of four images that relate to one of the following themes - escape, love, insecurity, found, lost, time or place. The images can be in any key and in any subject.

My final images must be in the form of four prints that work together as a series of images and should be a minimum of 6x9in

After plenty of research and thought, I have decided to go with the theme TIME for my series of images.

I am to take a series of photos that will represent time through the generations. I will be photographing my dear Nan, Mum, myself and my daughter, each holding an antique style frame.

I will then  post edit in photoshop, placing each image inside the frame that each subject is holding.
Get it?????

The set up to start with will be a high key light set up. The rest is pretty simple. Prop wise, all I need is a stool and the antique photo frame which my lovely friend Julie is supplying me with.
I am planning for us all to wear similar coloured outfits so the images all blend nicely. Either that or bold solid prime colours.

A colleague of mine Karl found an image similar to what I am hoping to achieve, I have attached said image below, I hope this gives you a better idea.
I am reversing the orderin what the images are in below as I feel photographs capture the past, so it makes sense for Nan to be the first image, finishing off with the newest member of female generation in the main final image. It will also make it easier for us to carry on the tradition. The new generation (Sarah my daughter) holding the past generations, me, mum and last but not least my Nan x

Watch this space, the shoot is on Thursday.......................

The finished product.

The photoshoot went well. My daughter Sarah helped me set up the studio which was located in St. Helens for a high key portrait set up something like this

Once the set was ready I met my mum and Nan and took them back up to the studio and briefed them on what would be happening during the photoshoot and how I was to achieve the final image. 

The shoot went smoothly, I think this was down to my smart plan. As normal I set my camera to full manual and on ISO 100, f/8 and ss 1/125. I immediately adjusted the aperture to a larger number as the image was quite dark but I knew that if I increased the power on the lighting it would blow the subject out as well as the background. I ended up with f/4.

Sarah was first, then my mum. My mum then captured the image of me. Last but not least was my dear nan, I had to make a few adjustments to the key light as the power was too high for her complexion and fair hair and washed her right out. I took it to f/9 from f/7.

Done! That was fun :o) Now to photoshop to manipulate the images to work together to create the final image similar to the one above.

Post editing

I opened up all my images in camera raw and made a slight adjustment to the curves on each image. I then converted all of the chosen images to JPEG. I then opened them in Photoshop CS 6 and began my editing.

I cropped the image to a 8 x 10 size. Did a few touch ups with the healing tool and used my eye define preset action(which is mainly dodge & burn). I then selected the area within the frame being held by subject using the polygonal Lasso tool, I then removed the background using the background eraser and finished by deselecting the area. I then added a new layer which the added image would sit on. Opening the other image of me, which was edited and ready to go I dragged across to the main image and place between the main layer and background layer, free transforming until it was in the correct position.(always remember to click on the link tab to maintain aspect ratio or it will make image look distorted.)

Quite simple really, I repeated this process for all images, ensuring that the top layer was always the top image. So Sarah, then me, then mum and finally Nan.

To finish off I merged layers, then added an unsharpen mask then flattened the full image.

Below are the series of images:

I think the images work in relation to my subject which is time. It represents time by demonstrating the mothers throughout my families generations. The first image being all the generations in relation to me, from youngest gen to oldest gen. The second image of course is me holding my past generations, the third image is my mum Julie holding her past generation, and last but not least the fourth image is my dear Nanny Eileen, the start of my living generation :0)

I am planning on doing this shoot again. We had lots of fun and enjoyed being together all at once ( we had a lovely lunch together afterwards). The main reason for wanting to repeat is so I can use a larger frame as I feel it wasn't quite big enough and my Nan seemed to get lost in the final image of us all, however the results look more than satisfactory on a large print such as a 8 x 10"

Leanne x

All in all a great family photography session!