Kids
What are the typical problems associated with photographing young children? They tend to move around a lot! They move front to back and they move left to right. Either of these can cause you problems. If your aperture is not small enough to provide plenty of depth of field, you run the chance of your subject being out of focus. In order to get enough light on the subject to provide a small enough aperture, you may need to work with the main light in quite close. The problem this causes is that if little Suzie moves even a little to the left or to the right, she can cause significant changes in exposure, making your images inconsistent and difficult to print. You can easily have a stop or more variance from one frame to the next if she moves to her left or to her right. This problem can be even worse if you have two or three children sitting next to each other. The light falloff from a closely placed main light can render your group over exposed on one side and under on the other. These problems are difficult and expensive to correct.

Moving your conventional main lightsource back will not fix this problem. Doing so will provide less light on the subject, requiring a wider aperture, thus limiting your depth of field. The light also becomes effectively smaller as you move it away making the light on the subject harsher and less flattering. 

The solution for these problems is the LightingMagic Kid/Group Panel. The way it works is very simple. It's large and sits directly on the floor. Newly redesigned, The Kid/Group Panel is now 6 feet wide and 5 feet tall.

The Lighting Magic Kid/Group panel may be used on the floor as show to the left or suspended between two light stands when the light source needs to be higher. Suspending the panel on two light stands is fast and easy.

You can now easily work with your children on the floor in complete freedom, rather than forcing them to sit on a table where there is little room for creativity and always the risk of falling. The Kid/Group Panel is typically placed 10 to 12 feet from the subject for proper portrait lighting with one edge right at the camera position. 

To the left we see the Kid/Group Panel set up with two lights facing the panel and an umbrela fill light in the proper place directly behind the camera.

Because the Kid/Group Panel is 6 feet wide, you can fire multiple lights onto it. This will produce a very large light source that has a wonderful soft look (even though it is used at a greater than typical away from the subject) but because you can use multiple lights, you have more power to achieve a smaller F stop and thus the depth of field you need to keep your subject in focus EVEN if they wander around. The Kid/Group Panel solves many problems and is extremely simple to use.

Family Portraits or Groups
The kid/Group Panel makes lighting families and groups incredibly simple and straigtforward.  Since the light source is single and very large, you will avoid uneven lighting across the group and will not encounter harsh shadows from one person falling on another typically caused by scattering umbrellas around the room. Simply elevate the panel on a couple of light stands, and bring one edge right up to the camera. Fire your lights at the panel and you will have the easiest, quickest and most goof proof group lighting you have ever experienced. Enjoy soft, beautiful light the is even across the entire group.

Outdoor photography
If you ever do location work outdoors and are faced with working in direct sun in the late afternoon, you have probably tried using flash fill to control the harsh shadows. The LightingMagic Kid/Group Panel provides a super easy way to simplify this problem. Because of the design, the Kid/Group Panel's legs can be adjusted and the panel used vertically as well as horizontally. Place the Kid/Group Panel several feet away from your subject so that it blocks all direct light from the sun as it nears the horizon. Now look at the soft, controled quality of light on your subject. Usually, a reflector fill is not even necessary to achieve studio quality portrait lighting.