First of all, I need to think about the image. I haven't find anything else than take a pencil, my copy book and draw a sketch... As you can see, I'm not a graphist and I don't know how to draw. Most of the time, I'm the only one to understand my sketches.
Not all the details are drawn. For me, it's just a reminder, not a fixed project list even if the photo is rarely different from the sketch.
By the way, here is the sketch of one of the image I've made for this photo shoot. Amazing... Piece of art... or not ;)
Note that the comments (mother, son, ...) have been added for this article. I usely don't note anything on my sketches and if I write something, I write it in french.
The sketch is done, only understandable by myself but done. Now, it's time to go on the field, to meet the stars (the family) and to shoot. Some days ago, I've talked with my clients to let them find a place somewhere they know and where they can feel confortable. Personnaly I prefer parcs but any place with natural light will be ok. For this example, the clients have choose to go in a small park that is at a few minutes driving from their home. It's important that the people that will be on the photo feels confortable in this place to make a nice image.If they are stressed or too tired by the trip, you will see that on the final image. Don't forget that the people you will photograph are not professional models and that the baby will surely not understand your needs and most of the time, will start to cry after 1 hour of shooting.
The button has been pressed, the photo is into the camera and I can now go back to my studio and work on the photo. As you can see on the raw image just above (without any modification, all lightroom sliders are set to 0) , there's serveral problems. Baby and father's skin is a bit greenish, father's skin is too dark, the grass on the front is too bright, higthlights are burned, the background is not dark enought.
For the problem of greenish skin, I use photoshop. For all other corrections, I use lightroom. This is a powerful tool for photographer. If you want to work faster : shoot raw and use lightroom (this is my most important advice in this article and no, I've no contract with Adobe... but if Adobe want to contact me I won't refuse ;) ).
And here is the final result.
To make this pictures, I've used my Canon 1D-X with the Canon 85mm f/1.2.
I'll post, in a few days, a more complet tutorial on my blog : http://www.etdesimages.fr/blog/
