DSLR photography for all skin tones

[Juliestcyr]

I know that photographing darker skin tones was a problem with film, and I know the problem persisted with digital technology to some extent.
I was mostly using my iPhone to photograph Brownie and Girl Guide events and I noticed that the girls with darker skin don't photograph as well. Mostly I was cleaning it up in PS with brushes. Today, I brought my DSLR to our Craft Day event. And... it wasn't much better. I was mostly using the "auto" setting on the DSLR, but the "indoor" setting was worse. If I used a flash, the lighter skinned girls were white as ghosts.
Any advice on what I need to adjust for a group photo where I can see everyone's facial features?

 

[BevG]

If you use Lightroom, you can us the radiant feature to lighten up the darker faces without changing the overall exposure of the photo. Shooting in raw gives you more control over exposure, etc.

 

[bestcee]

There's a good article from Adobe with some tips. While some won't apply to your girls, they might give you ideas? https://create.adobe.com/2017/11/28/_10_tips_for_photographing_darker_skin_tones.html

I thought the one about using dodge and burn was interesting. I hadn't thought of using that on faces before!

 

[bcgal00]

My granddaughter is darker skinned than her mom, so I expose for mom's face. When photographing them together I often create a curves adjustment (pulling up the midtones) inverted mask so I can brush a bit of lightness over my GD's face, at a low opacity.

 

[Scrapping with Liz]

That article was helpful @bestcee ! And thanks for that tip @bcgal00

I've had a hard time photographing my kids with a variety of skin tones. Some of them get pretty dark in the summer. This might help!

 

[Cherylndesigns]

I remember when I started converting my GK's pictures in the pool to B&W. They all had such different skin tones and I discovered if I converted to B&W that I had more control over their different skin tones.