Fun Summer Senior Session (with a sneak peek)

As the school year starts coming more into focus (no pun intended), it's been busy with students getting their senior photos done. Yesterday I had the opportunity to shoot Maria's senior photos. As we finished the session, I asked if she wanted a sneak peek at the photos before she would see all the photos. She said "yes" and so I thought a blog post would be a good way to show some of the techniques that I used to get the images as well as a way to showcase a few photos from her session. :) 

When I got her questionnaire back that I send to all my clients, she mentioned that she wanted her photos to be bright, happy and fun. I think that we nailed that part! The session was lots of fun for me personally and the entire time spent shooting was laid-back and relaxed. Meeting her, I knew that getting her to smile in front of the camera wouldn't be a challenge!

We started out the session with just some standard poses. I like to start with simple poses that aren't too hard or unusual just to get the person comfortable with me. I tend to shoot  somewhat up close to really capture the person's eyes, so this is another thing that I let them know so that they aren't freaked out by how close I get all the time. I tend not to shoot with a lot of gear and try to suggest locations that will have good available light. I feel this makes the session more free flowing and not tied down to one particular location for too long. 

I shot the photo above in a location where there was sufficient shade from the trees. The sun was low in the sky and I really enjoyed the soft light that I was able to get on the left side of her face.

For the photo above, I thought it would be a cool idea to have Maria stand on one of the park benches. My original plan was to shoot wide to show that she was up on the table. I had her play with her hair a bit and moved in closer and was able to capture this shot. I was shooting wide open and this provided the nice bokeh in the background. It helped that the trees were closer to eye level since we were both standing on the park bench and table.

We decided to change up locations after a little to get a different background. We headed over to a gazebo, but the sun was really harsh when it was hitting the steps where I planned to shoot. I broke out my 5-in-1 Reflector and used the middle disk, which acts as a diffuser. 

Maria's mom was nice enough to hold the reflector for most of the session if I needed to use it, but for this I actually held the diffuser behind my head and using one arm out secured it. (If you look closely, you can see the reflection in her eyes of the reflector and a dark line across the bottom of it, which was my arm holding it.) This allowed me to diffuse the straight on light but also get this angle for the shot. This happens to be one of my favorite shots from the session. 

To keep the photo session fun, I like to try out different poses. No, they're not going to be used as yearbook photos, but it gives another dimension to the photos. I try to stay creative while I'm shooting and try not to stick with the conventional poses, but give some variety.

I had pre-visualized this photo before the session. At first, I was going to try shooting it with my main portrait lens, but with the longer focal length that was not going to happen. I broke out my wide angle lens to get this shot. I used the widest focal length on it to try and remove as much possible distortion as I could before post-processing. I also made sure that her hair was as spread out as possible, which I think gave a cool look. I really like this pose because it's different and not something you see everyday. 

I like to usually take one or two photos of my subject looking away from the camera. I think this gives a different perspective of the subject that is normally not seen in the other photos.

We finished the end of the session with some more 'fun' shots that weren't the traditional senior photo. She mentioned that she wanted some photos with the sun in the background. We planned the session so that we could finish the session with the sun setting low and to have her in a field. Once again, I wanted to try out a non-traditional pose. We had a little bit of trouble nailing the pose, but when we got the hang of it, I think it produced some wonderful images. I had her awesome mom hold the gold reflector to give that warm glow to her face-- thank you again for holding the reflector! There were some of her looking at the camera, but I like the different look that looking down gave with the slight smile.

I had a wonderful and fun time doing Maria's senior photos and really think I was able to capture her 'smiley' personality. Thanks again for letting me capture part of your senior year! :)

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If you are looking for senior photos, please feel free to check out my website to see my other work and get contact information. If you have other photography needs, contact me to see if we can work out a customized photo package.