Mother and Son

[Steven G Webb]

There is a visual perception in photographs where the physical size the subject takes up in the image affects the subject's significance. We sometimes purposefully do a small child in a large world setting to exaggerate. However, small children grouped with adults need special attention so they aren't made insignificant in the picture. Couple of things I note about this mom and son picture: We really don't have much of a statement for either of them from the waist down. Bare legs bare feet which aren't in-step with the dressed up clothes and the studio setting. So, what we have here is a full grown person full length comparison with the little person's full length size. So mom is already a much larger figure than the son. Next, we have mom covering up much of the body of the son, again reducing his real estate ownership in the picture. Finally, we have a large space between head heights. The visual outcome is a picture of two people rather than a single subject which happens to be a pair of two people.

Suggestions: Angle mom away from the camera, bolster Jr. on a cushion or box about where he is positioned on mom and turned so his shoulders are parallel to hers, run the crop up. His eye level should be now about her cheek level (half a head difference) crop bordering shoulder to shoulder and the bottom of the crop line just above the boy's elbow level. Get mom's hands out from in front of him and give up that death grip. If she's clutching him, that comes from an uneasy feeling for one of them. Either he feels like he's going to fall or she feels like she's going to drop him. That can't have a good outcome. Get him stable and relative comfortable then have mom hold him at the hips just to steady him and keep in in place.

Results: He gains significance and isn't covered up, both look comfortable, head sizes are realistic yet close to look like a unified portrait of two, everything we don't need to be looking at is cropped out of the image.

Side note: Are you sure about the exposure? Face's skin tones are cool and that neurally suggests underexposure. I'd guess a third to half a stop.

Steve

[Dorian Jaye]

I think the image is very sweet. You've been given great cc already.
I'm new here so it was interesting to me to go back & look again after each cc to "see" it myself. Steve...very interesting & informative cc.
thanks for sharing.
Dori