[BrianR]

1) Let's call them "Self Portraits" and not that other icky word.

2) Don't rely on a high f-stop to cover focusing errors, aim to get the focus as dead on as possible. A spare lightstand set up with the top bit where your eye will go can work well to focus on, then nudge your eye up to it, collapse the stand and fire away. Or use a rope with one end tied to the tripod and a knot tied in at the distance your eye will be to the camera (don't pull too hard). The key is some way to consistently position yourself in the same spot. HDMI + live view to a screen mentioned above can also work great.

3) Look at examples from others in your line of work and try to reverse engineer the lighting and poses on the ones you like.

4) I agree with UncleVanya that you should consider if hiring a pro is appropriate or not. I've no idea the purpose of your photo, but (for example) looking through the real estate ads I know I'm less inclined to call up the ones with hideous and obviously home-made photos compared to those willing to spend a few hundred $$ for a polished and professional presentation.

[UncleVanya]

I've been playing around with this in my basement lately. Last year I simply focused on something then tried to approximate the exact location. I used a regular lamp with a $5 softbox overtop from ebay. This year I've been playing around with Yongnuo 560IV's and the Tx and some ebay soft boxes on stands. I have a medium gray cloth hung on a dowel and two hooks. I can do some high or low key using this based on how I set up the flashes. I was also given an old small square LCD computer monitor. I now have it hooked up via a couple of cables. K3 -> HDMI -> DVI. I then shoot myself in live view so I can see when my face turns white (focus peaking). Unfortunately I still can't see it well enough (visually impaired--I normally sit six inches from my 27" monitor) so a lot of trial and error is needed. I started by using the self timer and running back and forth. I'm now using a cheap remote shutter release. I'm fairly pleased with some of the results. Here's a few. The one with the wide brimmed hat was last year with the cheap lamp and mini soft box. The suit is new and more sophisticated so I had to get more sophisticated with my selfies or soemthing.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B12dWDIYqmC0MVJKaWJ6TmpLMGM

This is coming from someone who can't really see himself in a mirror, but it does feel quite strange repeatedly posing and I guess coaching yourself for protraits. I never do selfies otherwise.

Those are great.

[K-Three]

Agree with Uncle Vanya,
If you are actively involved in making the image, your mind and attention will be visibly "off" in the images. You can do a lot of the set up for what you want and even test shots with another person or object for lighting and focus,
but get someone else to push the shutter while you are in the shot. You are more likely to appear natural and engaged in the photo if you are not pushing the button.

[wissink]

Those are great.

Thanks! I did a minor OH *#(&#! after I shared that. Now everyone knows what i look like!

[UncleVanya]

Thanks! I did a minor OH *#(&#! after I shared that. Now everyone knows what i look like!

Let the stalking begin! LOL.

I think you are safe.

[JimJohnson]

The last time I was able to get my entire immediate family together was 5 years ago for about a half-hour. The timing eliminated any chance of using a studio photographer. My camera at the time was a K-r, so I had to use a mirror to assess the group's pose and a DIY remote release (https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/62-do-yourself/186110-make-wired-release-...ir-camera.html). You wouldn't need to do either of those with the K-3 line as you can use an external monitor - or the Pentax Flu-card with a PC to check the group's pose. And it is easy to cobble up a tiny easily hidden wired remote using the K-3's wired remote port.

The part that is consistent between what I did then and what I would do now with my K-3 is the lighting and focus. You can purchase a 3-light kit relatively inexpensively on ebay with 2 tall light-stands, 1 short light stand, two umbrellas and 3 - 100watt equivalent studio fluorescent bulbs. I only used the two umbrella units as key and fill lights. (I added two hardware-store clamp-on reflectors and another pair of fluorescent bulbs with the same color temperature, to use as rim lights [behind and above the group] for better background separation).

It takes several minutes for fluorescent lights to stabilize, but during that time I could use props (large stuffed animals) to assess lighting quality and make needed tweaks. And once the light output was stable, I used my 30+ year old cheap (even then) light meter in incident light mode in each anticipated face location and made a couple more tweaks.

Because our group (five of us) had to be in two ranks, I knew I would be stopping down. And at the same time I needed a soft focus on the background. So I used manual focus with the stopped down lens to achieve depth of field where I wanted it. Exposure was manual too. Knowing the needed aperture and the values from the incident light meter determined the shutter speed.

Finally during my half-hour time window, the stuffed animals were replaced with our group. With everyone in place, I used the mirror to assess the pose of the other four people, had them hold, moved my head into matching position and used my carefully hidden remote release. The previous post is absolutely correct. If you are focusing on the image in the mirror or monitor during the exposure, you will seem out of place. Since a group of people simply cannot hold a pose for more than a few seconds we repeated this exercise several times and I picked the best of the lot for printing.

While I spent a lot more than a half-hour getting this organized, we achieved our goal of a family portrait within the time we had.