How sweet it is! 300 Dads and more than 300 daughters attended the annual Father & Daughter Sweetheart Ball last weekend. The evening wouldn’t have been complete without each of the smartly dressed couples being photographed. Many thanks to my friends at the Highlands Ranch Community Association for this opportunity.
One young lady, now standing as tall as her dad, said it was their 12th year! Each year they frame the photograph and add it to the collage on the wall. Now that’s a really cool family tradition and a good reminder of the importance of my job. There’s no “second chance” with many of my assignments.
We brought our big studio strobes and a 5′ Octabank to light the set, which included the massive fireplace in the background. Did I mention that this event was held at the Highlands Ranch Mansion and the fireplace has been the backdrop since the first Sweetheart Ball. We used a second light, a smaller softbox to fill-in the scene and put light on that fireplace.
300 couples were photographed in 6 hours, each receiving a 4×6″ print in a nice folder. Despite the assembly line system and short time span, my intention was to give each one a beautiful photograph. That meant quickly arranging each couple with the daughter being prominent showcasing her dress. Dads were placed slightly behind their daughters so their size difference was minimized. The key to this was our piano bench set-up at an angle. I tripoded the Canon 5D so I could easily walk over and help arrange each grouping, go back, fire away. The 24-70 mm zoom lens made it easy to keep the same perspective as I zoomed out to accommodate larger families and zoomed back in for dads with one daughter.
It’s a lot of fun to look through these photographs noticing the resemblance between dads and daughters. Don’t you love the similar smiles in the last photograph? Judging by the smiles and expressions I’d say a good time was had by all.
