I'm currently planning for a photoshoot session with a couple of people, just for practice before my friend's senior pictures (she asked me to do them--so honored ). ANYWAYS, I'll be using my canon eos rebel xsi. I'm a beginner/intermediate photographer...so for all you dSLR users out there, I'll be grateful for any tips or techniques (besides PRACTICE haha, because I already do that!).

Thanks in advance

Btw, my gallery is here if anybody wants/needs to see it.

Bumpbump...
Anybody?

I'm no pro, but what kind of photoshoot will it be (in regards to subject/location/theme etc)? What kind of lens(es) will you be using with your camera? Do you have flash? Just sayin', there are sometimes some great shots to be had with off-camera flash.

Yeah, what type of setting will you have?
I'm no pro, but from my experience in shooting portraits, the most important factor is lighting.
For example, I shot this in my sun room with just a plain white wall, but it looks quite professional:
http://photos-b-4.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-...3_1074239_n.jpg

If you're outdoors, make sure you don't have objects (trees, buildings or w/e) in the way that will screw up the lighting... Basically make sure there are no shadows covering the face (or whatever you're making the main focus of the photo)

Good luck, and show us the results!

natural lighting is the best and of course no flash....try different angles(way up or at the feet), zoom-ups
play w/ props, like w/ trees hanging down, cover half the face

--edit--
but by your deviantart, i think youre a great photographer alrdy

make sure there's not shadows on the face. It's very distracting. In other words, make sure the lighting is right and hits all the right spots.
Natural lighten is good..
Don't you flash if you're going for a clear soft shot..
Try out angles to see which one fits.
Correct them if the picture look awkward or too posed.
I don't know much but yeah i hope that helps.

Is the photoshoot outside?

If so, make sure it's on a sunny day. Also, do it when the sun is not directly in front of you, so in the range of 1-5 PM.

Avoid shadows in face and all, by orienting yourself properly with respect to the sun. Do not use a flash. It will pretty much always overexpose your photos. If you really need it to fill out a bit, you can orient the flash so that it bounces on a white shirt or something, but not directly on the person (without a diffuser of course)

I usually try to max my bokeh effect by using large apertures, if you have a distant background and wanna isolate the subject.

Try out with angles. Try with different apertures. Have some fun with shutter speeds and jumps. Some shots against the sun can be awesome too (shadow people). I find the 85mm f/1.8 a great lens for shoulder/head portraits, with very pleasing bokeh. The 50mm f/1.8 produces very good and crisp results too. They are both inexpensive and produce results much more worth their price imo. Use ISO 100 for outdoors, but you might find yourself needing ISO 200 for making shadows less harsher in some shots.

If it's inside, boost your ISO (800-1200 maybe) and use flash if needed, but it's much harder and I'm not that experienced for that yet.

Hope that helped!